


Beautiful losers

by BloodyBlow



Category: The Venture Bros
Genre: Blood, Brock/Rusty, Character Development, Developing Relationship, Gary/Monarch, Gary/Monarch/Dr.Girlfriend, Idiots in Love, Jared/Dean - Freeform, M/M, brusty, fanfic with plot, funny moments, swering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:55:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 49,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22171399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BloodyBlow/pseuds/BloodyBlow
Summary: Rusty and Brock dealing with their feelings and self-understanding right after the events of 7th season. Practically, two idiots in love with a plot - fun stuff included.P.S. looking for BETA readers! - please, contact bloodyblow-blog (Tumblr).Warning: this work's still under construction (aka it's structure/style can be changed in the future, but not the plot).Checklist of the fanfic:♥Spoilers up to and including 7 season – checked♥Main pairing Brock/Rusty – checked♥Existing plot - checked♥Getting together without booze - checked♥Violence scenes - checked♥Explicit language - checked♥Awkwardness – checked♥Attempts at joking – checked♥Raw sex – checked (*highly unrecommended in real life*)
Relationships: Brock Samson/Rusty Venture
Comments: 29
Kudos: 31





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Nice comments/kudos are very much appreciated as encouragement to write more.  
> Native English speakers – please, feel free to write me (Tumblr - bloodyblow-blog) to correct any grammar mistakes (not in the comments).

The day didn’t start nice.

And it didn’t get any better. For all Rusty knew, things were falling down as quickly as a crushing plane. The man looked around once again, growl of frustration vibrating in his throat. There was no way out.

He had been chained here, inside a dimly lit tent, for a rather long time. Long enough to make his wrists feel all numb and aching, not even mentioning the need to empty the bladder - capturers, which obviously worked for the Guild, weren’t much of welcoming hosts.

So, obviously, Rusty hadn’t any other choice but to ignore this required inconvenience and continue listening to the pure nonsense that was happening outside his little prison. "Where the hell is Brock" he thought tiredly, his eyes rolled up in royal dissatisfaction. 

"This isn’t wood. This is a real sword” the pitchy voice, which no doubt belonged to the one and only Monarch, exclaimed somewhere behind the curtains.

“Yes. And that is your sworn enemy” the other man answered.

Rusty’s sixth sense suggested that the subject of the talk was, in fact, his poor self. He frowned at the assumption and fidgeted in his shackles uncomfortably "What in the hell is this child’s play?! They can’t be serious, right?..” he was thinking.

The whole seriousness of the situation was realized by Doc as the curtains whooshed open and revealed the Mighty Monarch with a giant sword in hands. The suited-up man looked ridiculous with a medieval weapon, surrounded by a circle of weird-dressed-up villains, which Rusty didn’t really bother to examine much but rather attacked first. Attacked with the best he had - annoying complaints. 

So, imagine that - being his typical oh-please-this-happens-all-the-time self, the scientist was boldly declaring opinion on the violation of Guild rules. With a rag stuffed in his mouth... Well, at least, he tried to, although the villains simply ignored the muffled shouting and carried on. 

“So… I can just like… kill him?” The Monarch wondered and Dr. Venture immediately intensified his illegible protest. At this point the man couldn’t help imagining this absurd scene being his finish line, the last episode of the boy adventurer show. To die in a fucking circus in your underwear – what a great way to go for a super-scientist!.. Yes, yes, there it was again. Rusty’s famous bad luck. The exact one that had been ruling throughout his entire life. Nothing new there – apparently, the winning streak just had to have its rightful break. 

The curtains had closed yet again to leave the enemies together. Founding himself in a confined place with the villain, Dr. Venture continued screaming in actual panic - he didn’t want to die, especially in such stupid circumstances. The man had struggled with the shackles for a bit longer, only making the pain in his body get worth, and eventually gave it up, going all limp. His shiny doe-like eyes were staring at the Monarch, reading his expression, trying to get into the nemesis’s head. 

And then something clicked. Something right inside the Monarch’s brain, Rusty could almost hear it. The other man lowered his sword, confusion on his pale face mixed with something else. Was it pity?.. Or may be fear, even pain?.. Definitely, the crazy combination of many things - Doc wasn’t great with empathy to understand it and, let’s be real, it didn’t matter at the moment to him. What mattered was the fact that Rusty knew for sure the Monarch wouldn’t murder him, not like this anyway. The scientist had probably looked pathetic enough to make even the nuts villain question the whole killing thing.

Still, two men were just staring at each other, uneasy silence kept between them. The Monarch was first to avert his eyes. He started to drill the floor with his heavy gaze, not blinking at all, like he was in some kind of paralysis. And then his brows suddenly tightened, lips strained in a furious grimace - for a second Rusty felt his guts get tense yet again. A sigh of relief escaped his mouth as the archenemy rushed out of the tent and poured all the frustration and outrage out on the Guild members.

And while the Monarch and his loyal henchman were yelling around, Dr. Venture was gathering all the four-letter words he knew to call his soi-disant bodyguard - although the lynching had been cancelled, at least for a moment, you could never be sure about something with those crazy lunatics. They would easily be able to change their minds out of the blue or actually make up something way more humiliating for the scientist than just… dying.

The commotion in the room had finally decreased leaving Rusty with the bitter acknowledgment of the fact that the Monarch had achieved the tenth level during this awkward ritual. Without a doubt, this meant Doc’s peaceful life had come to its end and in no time his “sworn enemy” would be annoying him again with his ludicrous attacks. On the other hand, the spectacle had ended, which also meant that Rusty would probably be set free. And, indeed, a minute or so later two alike Guild agents, that were Ward and Watch, entered the room. Rusty could hear one of them saying "...we need to get Doctor Venture back". Then they pulled away the curtains.

"I gotta say it. I can't hold it in" the pointy-nose agent declared with a wicked grin. 

"Dude, not the right time" the other man warned, his eyes getting bigger as he spoke.

Obviously, Watch couldn’t be bothered - he looked pretty exhilarated, shaking his fists in a spoilt child’s manner "I have to. It's too good!"

The Monarch turned around intrigued by the whispering at his back - and as Watch stepped further and cleared his throat, Wade hurried to unshackle the scientist. And then was it. The moment of truth. The news no one had been expecting.

"...what have you just said?" The Monarch asked with a quiet voice, his face perfectly straight.

"I’ve said that you and Doctor Venture are blood…"

"Shut up, he got it" Ward interrupted and shoveled his colleague with an elbow.

The yell "Are you kidding me?!" was most probably heard in the entire galaxy. In any case, it had clearly popped Rusty’s ears for a moment. “Aah, I did really need this" the man thought sarcastically and pulled the gag out from his mouth. He massaged his wrist slightly, brows curved in discontent.

“I suggest you return me back home right away. The OSI won’t appreciate what you have done here” he insisted with a cocky composure.

The Monarch’s eye twitched as he turned his head to the arch-nemesis and hissed “You… you…”. The villain didn’t even hesitate to snatch the sword from the ground and dashed forward, swinging it around like a crazy man.

“I will fucking kill you!..” he yelled trying to break out from his henchman’s hold. Fortunately, Dr. Mrs. The Monarch joined Gary as fast as she could.

“Calm down, honey, don’t disgrace yourself” she whispered.

“Disgrace?.. Disgrace?!” the man’s fury seemed to grow even stronger “Have you even heard what those fucks have said?!”

In no time the room was filled with a passionate quarrel of the Monarch family, other villains watching the scene with silent interest. And Rusty, being a quite experienced adventurer as he was, used the moment to help himself out from that room. Thanks to the chance, the scientist had already been conscious when being dragged to the ritual place, so he had no problem in finding his way back to the teleport.

“Ick,” he squalled at the unexpected sight of the dead bodies pile and harsh metal smell in the control compartment. Rusty held his nose at instance and looked around - on the old lab-machine’s panel there was a printed-out report. Of course, it was relocated to the Doc’s hand right away.

"Ookay" the man murmured, looking at the numbers "So we are related... rather closely I would say. I hope my _dear_ father didn’t leave more surprises like that".

The moment Rusty teleported to his apartment he felt a sudden nausea, an unbearable need to vomit all caused by the unwonted travelling and the heavy odor of blood. He could manage one thing at a time, but both made his stomach turn inside out, so he didn’t even hesitate to puke right on the floor.

"Ah, here you are, Doc" Rusty heard the well-known voice of his bodyguard.

The man snapped the neck of his unfortunate enemy and released the grip, body falling to the floor with a thump. Brock’s entire face and naked torso were cover in blood, his eyes shining with excitement. Indeed, he had passed time well being entertained by the Guild minions while Dr. Venture had almost wettened his pants back at the evil’s den.

The older man wiped his mouth in a harsh motion and grabbed the teleportation device. A loud beep after Rusty had pressed the button signaled that the thing was off.

"So, that’s what you were doing, when my life was threatened", the scientist stroked a pose of indignation.

The other man spread his arms protesting "Oh, come on, Doc! If they were serious, they wouldn’t send those guys to distract me".

"Oh, really?.. And what if it was their tactic to make you think that they weren’t serious, hm? " Rusty raised his brows and shook the head in disbelieve "I would be already dead!.. Great job, so-called bodyguard".

"You aren’t dead" the blond man answered apathetically "and also I was guarding the tower".

The scientist hemmed and headed to the door frame, his feet squishing on the blood puddles. "Your job is to protect me, not some building. I could… what in the hell?!”

The beautiful scene opened before the man’s eyes - a total wreck of the apartment - blood everywhere, shattered glass, broken furniture. Rusty didn’t even want to imagine what mess Brock had left on the other floors. "Protecting the tower, you say?" the little man resented. "I hope you, at least, did better job with Hank".

"Relax, Doc. Hank wasn’t here, he went to Sirena or something" the man sighed and sympathetically slapped the scientist on the shoulder "Was it that bad?.."

Rusty shrugged. He folded arms in a protective way, trying to comprehend everything that had happened to him that day. The man hadn’t really had time to think about the events, probably still remaining in a slight shock "For a second I… I have actually thought that he may kill me this time".

"He? You mean..."

"The Monarch, of course” Rusty shook his shoulder and moved forward into the bedroom, red spots printing on the floor. “His crazy Guild friends literally told him to kill me if he pleased. With a damn sword, Brock. A sword!.. That’s just… ridiculous".

The bodyguard silently followed the other man into the room and joined him on the mattress. “Didn’t they mention Saphrax?” he question while Rusty was taking off his sweaty T-shirt.

“What?.. How do you know?”

“Eh, it’s just an old Guild tradition” Brock shared with Dr. Venture in a casual manner. The latter rolled his eyes wondering if the man had been aware of the abduction purpose all along.

“Well, maybe you will be surprised to know that he actually tried to kill me after the ritual had finished” Rusty chuckled nervously and looked back at the bodyguard “Because, guess what, Brock. He is my fucking brother”. 

Brock raised his brow in confusion.

“You know,” he concluded after some thinking “I can kind of see that”.

“What?.. Really?!” Rusty felt deeply offended. He couldn’t imagine being compared to the Monarch – a total nut, obsessed with Dr. Venture for literally no reason, a man that had always had the dumbest ideas ever, with his long-ass loopy speeches and provoking fashion style. The scientist was mentally ready to get all hysterical on Brock, but the blond man was saved by the call Doc received.

“It’s Dean” Rusty threw out at the bodyguard, who then moved closer to see the caller too. The young man on the screen looked rather agitated, but it wasn’t a good enough reason to start worrying – the boy had a sensitive personality.

“Eeeem, why are you both naked?..” Dean asked awkwardly, making Dr. Venture and Brock look at each other with confusion and then sudden embarrassment. 

“Okay, that… that doesn’t really matter” the scientist’s son interrupted. “Have you seen Hank?.. He’s just left the hospital without a word”.

“The hospital?.. But Brock said he was with Sirena” the father goggled at the blond man theatrically and then turned back to the watches “Dean, what has happened?”


	2. The day X

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: there may be some sad things in the chapter, but I doubt they will make your mood gloomy

It was a typical Venture morning with the alarm going off at unpredictable time, this once at 8 am.

J.J. hologram yet again reminded Rusty to be productive, positive and to spend some time with Sally and Rocket. The man whined at the fact that he had never got around to fix the thing. Sometimes he was that lazy. Or maybe subconsciously he believed to deserve a little kick in the ass from his dead brother.

Several more minutes of lying in bed and the previous day events had started to come in Dr. Venture’s mind - and even for him it was too much to handle. Not only he had been kidnapped and threatened to be killed, not only his nemesis had gotten the high level enough to arch him again, not only the very same nemesis had appeared to be Rusty’s brother, but also his apartment needed another overhaul, Hank had gotten into the hospital and then had net-gunned Dean in attempt of kidnapping him because previously mentioned Dean had slept with brother’s girlfriend… Doc’s head was splitting. He couldn’t laze in the bed anymore with all the thoughts floating around, so he put on his rob and came to the kitchen. 

Brock and Hank had already been sitting around the table, having their breakfast. Rusty joined them with a simple “morning” and it wasn’t long before H.E.L.P.eR. served his portion of omelet. The scientist glanced at the son carefully, sipping cofix – the young man had a reddened scratch on his forehead but overall nothing had seemed to change in his cheerful personality at all.

“Sooo…” Rusty drawled looking with concern at his son, "How do you feel today, Hank?"

The older twin wouldn’t even look away from his bowl but rather answered with his mouth full of cereals “I’m fine, pop. Havin’ the interview at Jose’s car service”. He sounded more than enthusiastic.

“Hey, that’s great, Hank” the bodyguard cheered the man up and smiled. Apparently, after the unfortunate bat mask had been hidden away, Brock decided not to bring the subject of the brother-assault up. Instead, he changed the topic.

“You can relax, Doc. The Monarch won’t be arching you anytime soon”.

“Why is that?” the scientist asked skeptically picking at his food.

“The Guild has recently issued new regulations concerning relatives in Arch-Nemesis Assignment Program” the blond man informed. “Basically, the Monarch will have to go through seven circles of bureaucracy hell to get you as an official enemy”. 

Dr. Venture could only chuckle at the statement “Well, at least I have _several_ days to come around”.

Sudden beep and vibration made everyone look down at the table, where the new model of rebranded jPhone was laying (vPhone, obviously) - the blue blinking light indicated a new massage. Then the thing beeped one more time. And then again. Making a curious hem, Rusty took the device and opened the chat with unknown numbers.

NUM69: SCREW U U WONT FUCKIN HIDE FOREVER

NUM69: I FUCKIN HATE U FUCKIN FUCK

NUM21: He didn’t really mean that

NUM69: I HATE U SO MUCH!!! U TOOK MY CHILDHOOD!

NUM69: AND ILL GET MY REVENGE 4FKN SURE

NUM21: Dude, don’t be a douche, he’s ur brother

NUM69: ur right im sorry

NUM69: SORRY THAT I DON’T GIVE AN F BOUT THAT

“Block the numbers” Rusty commented on his actions with a fed-up sigh.

***

“You can’t write to this number. What?..” the Monarch stared at the phone with irritation. The man had recently wakened up and was finishing his breakfast at the moment. “He has blocked me! Can you fucking believe that?!”

“Yes, I can” Gary, who was sitting next to him, answered without hesitation, “What did you expect exactly?.. That he would invite you to come over to the family dinner or something?”

“I don’t know!” the Monarch folded his arms and pouted. He always did what his heart said him to do. One day it was to spare Dr. Venture’s life, the other day it was to write him assaulting messages. Not a big deal.

“Anyway, you are my henchman” the villain pointed a finger at the other man, trying to sound less domestic, which wasn’t easy to do thanks to the wine-color plush rob he was wearing “you should agree with me, not… read lections”.

Gary sighed and took away the empty plates from the table – he had cooked some bacon with fried eggs for that morning – and placed them in the sink. “First of all, I am your friend” he ensured sincerely “and I want you to be happy”.

The Monarch brows instantly curved into the Pierrot’s expression “But how can I be happy if I can’t do the only thing I care about?..”

“Come on, you still have a chance, right?” the other man’s voice got softer as he couldn’t stay annoyed at his boss for too long, especially seeing his soul’s torment. “Didn’t Dr. Mrs. The Monarch say that…”

At the mention of his wife, the villain banged his head on the table dramatically. “She left me!..” he rose the head harshly, looking at the shocked henchmen “The beautiful monarch butterfly that she used to be will never see this cruel world again! She pupated for one more time and became no less than a black hearted cinnabar moth!..”.

“Oh, come on” Gary came closer to the other man, who leaned his whole upper body on the tabletop and was lying like that with eyes full of despair.

“She is a councilwoman,” the henchman stated, “she has to do all this… Guild stuff. And you are happy for her success, right?”

The Monarch whined and straightened up a little “I _am_ happy for her, but… I am also confused. I don’t feel like myself anymore. My Number Two has abandoned me and became my boss and then, when I need her moral support so much, she’s leaving me with eight tons of stupid paperwork that I can’t even understand”.

The man turned around to face Gary, f, who then soothingly placed his hands on the Monarch’s shoulders “You love each other, that’s what important”. He added little pressure to his grasp sending tingling down the villain’s body “And now _I_ am your Number Two, remember?.. I promise, I won’t let you down, Monarch. And together we’ll make Dr. Venture your archenemy again”. 

“You’re right, my loyal Number Two”, the man jumped up and raised his fist in the air with a crazy grin “we are a dream team! We don’t need Dr. My Wife to… fill those papers?..” his voice went down on the last part and he slowly sat back in the chair.

“By the way,” the Monarch cleared his throat, “one of the Number’s Two duties is shoulder massage. So, you can place your hands back”. 

***

"Okay, I’m done here. Have work to do" Dr. Venture decided and stood from the table. Before going to the office he deliberately left his phone in the kitchen, foreseeing the future message-attacks.

However, the scientist didn’t manage to avoid attack of different kind. The one with an eye-patch, red whiskers and hoarse voice. As soon as Rusty crossed the threshold of the Pirate’s office, he was welcomed by dramatic yelling “Aaaarrrrgggghhhh! Batten down the hatches, Dr. Venture! Strike Colors! Ven-Tech's 'bout to meet Davy Jones' Locker!” 

“All right, all right, you got my attention” the man admitted “now let’s talk sense”.

“Deal, Chairman” the Pirate agreed and pointed to the sit next to his “Ye know our ship ain’t doing so well. Here are some papers with graphs and numbers ye’d like to check”. The man passed a thick stack of analytical documents to Rusty.

“Iffen ye go to the last page, Doc, ye can see Ven-Tech soon be feeding the fish”.

The scientist frowned and followed the instructions. Obviously, the company wasn’t living through its best - scanty income it produced didn’t compare to the Gargantula-2 losses and other expenses like developing and constructing teleport prototype, the tower’s repair or… Dean writing a check for 1 million dollars to the Monarch.

“When did this happen” Rusty wondered with regret. Apparently, he shouldn’t have trusted his youngest son with the money either.

The Pirate looked on his own copy of papers and continued “So, what’s yer suggestions, Chairman? Any doodads Science Club of yer came up with?”

“Well” Dr. Venture laughed uneasily, “we have a thermal regulation suppository”. The eye-patched man wrinkled at the reference.

“It could be redesigned, I guess…” Rusty proceeded “But it’ll take some time. And the first prototype has been kind of… destroyed”.

The Pirate was ready for this turn of events and answered as a professional “Aye, Doc, we have to take preventive actions before ye finish some fancy gadgets of yers. We need to cut unnecessary expenses not to be scuttled at once”.

"Well, we can save some money on stupid things like free paper cups and tea for employees or say... free insurance?" the scientist suggested.

"Arrr, no!..” the Pirate yelled with passion. “We are dividing yer personal account and the company’s one. Ye’ll have to get the committee approval to withdraw any amount of money from the Vent-Tech fund".

Ruty’s jaw simply dropped down "I am sorry?.." he asked with a barefaced shock.

The next ten minutes passed in constant yelling. Dr. Venture, of course, didn’t want to lose his freedom with money but, to a greater extent, he didn’t want to be portrayed as a spineless little man whose employees were bossing him around. In spite of it, Rusty had actually ended up agreeing to the proposed conditions. He understood that the Pirate genuinely wanted to see the company prospering, at least for the shake of J.J. 

For a dramatic effect Doc left the office with a loud door slam and then took an elevator to the lower floor. He really needed to start working or, more likely to make his employees start working, on some “fancy gadgets”. But, eventually, entering the lab wasn’t the best idea at the time.

Instead of friendly greetings, Rusty was welcomed with a dull explosion, that was followed by thick grey smoke. "What the hell" he grumbled covering nose with a hand and moved to the sound of familiar voices.

"I’m all right, Billy!.. I’m all right, pally" the albino was coughing in a distance.

“Thanks God!..” the other man shouted with worry “I thought there for a moment that you may be injured or something".

"What the hell is going on here?" Dr. Venture demanded to know while waving away the smoke in front of his face.

White grinned nervously and stood behind the smaller guy like that would make him invisible. Rusty sighed - sometimes the inseparable “couple” just draw him crazy.

“The… experiment”, Billy answered lamely, his eyes strayed to the side.

“What kind of experiment?” Doc insisted after placing his arms on the hips. 

Quizboy shrugged with an awkward smile “The… failed one?”

“Jeez, the day is just getting better and better” Dr. Venture mumbled to himself and then addressed his friends “All right. I need you to clean up this mess and then start considering new customer-friendly design for a thermal regulation device. Capiche? Can’t even imagine how it could come to someone’s mind to make a suppository”.

White, who had already felt the impunity, tilted his head a little “But, Rust, wasn’t it y…”

“A da, da, da, da!” the scientist waved his forefinger “No excuses here. Just do your job and… try not to blow anything up again”.

***

Walking down the late-winter boulevard was a good thing. Refreshing. Making the head clearer, despite the New York’s pollution. For Rusty it was a nice way to change focus for a moment, to relax and get a rest from bad luck at work.

Of course, he could have drowned his sorrows in alcohol, but he wasn’t like that anymore. And he was proud. After all, if he had been able to give up pills and Brock - smoking, then he could surly stop getting drunk as well.

His destination was the Stuyvesant University – for some reason, Rusty believed that talking to Dean would be a good family experience since their relationships had gotten way better lately. The father could ask his son about favorite subjects, or his roommate, or local bullies… Overall, he could get distracted by somebody else’s problems.

The square near the university was less busy that it had been in autumn - stone benches surrounding the fountain in front of the building were mostly free. It was a surprise for Dr. Venture to see, that on one of them there was his younger son, sitting alone, biting into a sandwich full of lettuce. He seemed to be in a pensive mood.

"May I?" Rusty simply asked and looked on the free place near the younger man.

"Oh, yes, of course" Dean nodded and politely moved closer to the edge of the bench. His father didn’t hesitate to sit down, his arms spread around the stone back.

"So. How is your life of a student going?" the man asked friendly looking at his offspring.

“I don’t know, pop” Dean had already finished munching and leaned on his thighs. “Everything is so… so complicated”.

“Well… Dean, you are a smart boy, you are” Rusty patted his son on the back “You just need time to integrate into collage life”. 

“But… studying not the only problem. I’m so confused with everything” the young man put his head in his hands. “Sirena, Jared… Everything!.. I miss hanging out with Hank and you and… ” Dean wiped his nose and looked back at the father, hope in his eyes “Pop, can I… move in with you again?”

Rusty bit his lip. He didn’t expect that conversation with Dean would lead to such a depressing turn. Of course, he wouldn’t mind having his son back, but… there was always a “but”.

“Dean, listen, I don’t know if it’s a good idea…” the sentence was interrupted at the very middle, as Dr. Venture jumped up and back down on the bench scared by the sudden short shriek of disgust on the left of him. He turned his head in hurry and gasped.

Dean’s upper part was completely covered with pink sticky goo. And the very same goo was smudged on the side of Rusty’s only winter coat and partly on his trousers – instantly he felt the wetness and coldness of the unknown substance. His presentiment suggested it wouldn’t be easy to wash this out.

"What the..." Dr. Venture raised his voice overlooking a man few meters ahead of them. A young man with the plastic bucket in his hands and a familiar bat mask.

"Ahaha!" the man laughed and started searching for something in his backpack. 

"Behold my killer-bees!" he yelled taking out some kind of jar and threw it on the paving stones.

The glass smashed to pieces. Dean, who always wasn’t fond of scary bugs, squeezed into the bench and screamed like a little girl watching the black-and-yellow insects from the jar surrounding him. For a second Rusty had panicked too, sliding to the other end of a bench as fast as he could. However, his fright had mostly been caused by the abruptness, and pretty soon he pulled himself together. 

"Calm down, Dean" he ordered tiredly. "It’s just hoverflies. And I don’t even wanna know where your brother has gotten them".

Of course, the loud yell had attracted attention to the Ventures but the only person to actually approach them was Dean’s roommate.

“What has happened?..” he asked with concerned tone, looking at the scene of Rusty trying to clean his son’s eyes with a napkin. The young man was sobbing out of stress and, probably, shame.

“Jared, right?..” Dr. Venture asked rhetorically “Could you help your roommate with… that? I’m afraid a napkin won’t do much”.

The brown-haired man gladly agreed “Of course, I’ll take Dean to the dorms. Come on”. He took his roommate’s hand like if he had been a child and led him towards the university.

Rusty sighed heavily, raising his hand to make a call, and to his astonishment, Hank answered quite fast.

“Hey, pop” the blond man greeted with a shameless face.

“Ooookay…” Dr. Venture replied with bewilderment, he definitely didn’t expect that kind of reaction. “Hank, what were you doing five minutes ago?” 

The son fixed his branded cap proudly and smirked “Well, I was at my job. Yes, Hank Venture is working at the car service now, like a real man”.

“That’s good. Very good, young man,” Rusty agreed and almost felt sorry to continue the conversation. “But, actually, I wanted to talk with you about D…”

“Sorry, pop,” Hank broke in not willing to discuss the subject. “Have to run, it’s work” he got off and ended the call.

***

About an hour later Rusty entered the Ven-Tech building. He had already been overwhelmed by the day events and had decided to put the problems aside for the evening.

Passing the reception by, the tired man tossed his stained coat at Sergeant Hatred with a brief remark "To the laundry”. Uncle’s evident curiosity was simply ignored as Dr. Venture didn’t feel like chit-chatting at the moment. Without elaborating he entered the elevator and selected “Lobby”.

The doors closed smoothly and as smoothly the car started moving up. For some reason Rusty couldn’t get rid of the thought that he would eventually get stuck. He wasn’t superstitious as any respected scientist had to be, but still - the man closed his eyes and exhaled deeply. “It’s okay,” he mentally assured himself “half of the day off to recover and tomorrow I’ll deal with the problems”. The last part that had mentioned the problems made Rusty’s lip curve down in a sad crescent.

_He needed to be a Father. He needed to maintain the company. He needed to carry on the legacy. He needed to take control of his own life._

Beep.

_Yeap. All this could definitely wait until the next day._

The elevator stopped and the door opened with a soft mechanic sound. Leaving thoughts behind, Rusty came out into the lobby and almost bumped into his bodyguard.

"Hey,” Brock greeted briefly and looked the other man up and down “What’s with the pants?"

"Hank" the answer was short and dull. "He poured some sticky shit on me and Dean and then released several semi-dead flies” Rusty smirked. Few second passed before he processed what had been said and frowned “My God… I’ve just realized. He reminds me of the Monarch".

“Well, that’s new” Brock admitted with a raised brow. “I thought Hank would be over it the next day”.

Rusty rolled his eyes as he so much loved to do before complaining “I wish he would!.. My day had already been terrible before he came along in his stupid bat mask and ruined my only decent coat. Two absolutely terrible days in a row, can you imagine!..” the shorter man finished with taking off winter boots and straightened up. ”Soooo… Now I’m going to have a good time. I don’t know – like watching TV and snaking some nachos” the man paused for a second in thoughts and then glanced at the bodyguard “What about you, care to join?”

Unfortunately, it was a little too late when Rusty noticed that Brock had pressed the elevator’s button – so he was about to leave the apartment. Dr. Venture immediately felt like a fool but didn’t show a sight of it. 

“Sorry, can’t do. OSI business” the blond man answered while the doors were opening and then entered the car.

“All right, whatever” Rusty instantly waved a hand pretending not to care. But quite frankly, he did care. He felt a bit disappointed and, in some instance, betrayed – Brock was _his_ bodyguard, he couldn’t be on the OSI missions that weren’t connected with the Ventures. Logic suggested that the man basically wanted to pass time with his work-buddies. Apparently, Brock’s family spirit was there only for the boys. 

“’kay”, the bodyguard threw out and touched the elevator’s panel, “You… have fun, Doc” he added as the doors were closing.

"Ok, I will have fun" Rusty promised to himself determinedly and headed to the liquor bar.

He had been standing there for a whole minute looking up and down the shelves, where very few drinks were presented. "Phhhh,” he finally managed and stepped away “I’ve worked too hard on this".

So, the scientist decided to stick to the original plan - booze replacement was a glass-bottle of cool grape-soda accompanied with microwaved cheese popcorn. And for a "dessert", which actually would be a main course too, there was a very rare Louise Willington move, which Dr. Venture had bought at the auction and hadn’t watched yet.

The man made himself comfortable on the coach and pushed the play button - a ball of popcorn on his lap, legs placed on a nearby short table. Rusty rubbed his hands in anticipation - the movie had begun.

It wasn’t more than ten minutes when Dr. Venture felt the need to wet his whistle after few rounds of salty snack. He grabbed the soda and unscrewing its cap. Well, he tried to. He really did. He did try several times. He even winded a piece of his speedsuit around the bottle’s neck for easier unscrewing but that didn’t help. The sad mourning noises escaped Rusty’s throat as he leaned back with his eyes closed.

Of course, that little problem must have been the production defect, and the man wouldn’t react too emotionally about that the other day, but at the moment he was triggered. There were too much of unresolved stuff on his shoulders. He felt pathetic again. Weak, old and pathetic - what a combo.

Rusty simply stared at the ceiling, no thoughts inside his head, while Louise was having fun at the evening party on the TV screen. "...and now you should press this exact spot really good" the squeaky woman’s voice instructed, making Dr. Venture straighten up with his eyes open wide.

"What the fuck" he whispered in disbelieve watching the little woman on a screen massaging someone’s foot, which definitely wasn’t the part of the movie. Rusty clenched his fists and tightened the jaw, the left eye slightly twitching.

 _Beep-bop-boop_! - the vPhone notification rang and the bottle nothing less than burst in Rusty’s hand, with the sweet purple liquid spilling all over his speedsuit and the coach. Little pieces of glass stuck inside man’s palm.

Slowly, with his whole buddy shivering in the attempt to stay put, Dr. Venture started extracting glass pieces one by one. The vPhone buzzed again. And then again. And then... well, then it was launched right into the face of a squeaky woman.

"That’s fucking it, I’m done!" Rusty yelled throughout the empty apartment and rushed to the old phone, blood dripping from his hand.


	3. Rash decisions are the best ones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oopsie, it takes a lot of time to write, but I'd like to finish the thing :3 Kudos/comments help!  
> Too bad - I have to change many parts of the fanfic that I included in the draft.  
> BTW - inform me, please, if there are any mistakes (in private). Have a nice day (=

A little more than twenty minutes had passed and Rusty was still sitting on the floor near the OSI phone, panting quietly, desperately trying to calm down. He hadn’t been that angry for ages.

New York, despite of the expectations, had brought even more stress to Dr. Venture’s life – stress, that had been accumulating since the very arrival and, finally, had overflowed. Every cell of the scientist’s body had been screaming in need of the world to get lucid and ordered, demanding Rusty to take things in his hands and to do at least something. And he had.

The man’s breath became less shallow and uneven as he was weighing the rash decision he had made – to reach the OSI and apply for a contract work. Surprisingly, it felt good to have a pure evidence of being in charge of his own life. It felt good to be in control, to have nerves to decide. And it didn’t even matter that the job implied traveling to a remotely located OSI base, because Dr. Venture believed that, for once, he had done something right. Something that would finally help him to level up the game. 

"What the fuck, Doc?!" the bodyguard came out of nowhere scaring the shit out of Rusty. Apparently, the scientist had been so deep inside his mind that he hadn’t even noticed an elevator stopping on the same floor just a meter away.

"Jesus Crist! You’ve almost gave me a stroke" the man flinched and raised up swiftly leaning on the wall. "What are you even yelling about?.." he continued with annoyance, confused to be seen by Brock in such an awkward and, dare I say, vulnerable state.

And that is because for Rusty Brock had been the one to look up to, to desire approval from, at least subconsciously. He was a perfect sample of a real man as well as Doc’s notable and respectable father – with the only difference that Rusty didn’t hate the bodyguard down deep his soul. On the contrary, he had always got a little crush on the blond man and sometimes had acted too needy around, which probably had been seen only as a result of self-esteem issues.

But don’t get the wrong idea - being amused, intimidated, protected and comforted by Brock for no less than twenty years had not only made affectionate feelings blossom inside Rusty’s heart. Those long and confusing years had also made the scientist convince himself to have primarily platonic, family-related emotions towards the bodyguard. And this auto-suggestion had also demanded from him to develop defense mechanisms like using sarcasm, pretending not to care or, which had already been in the past, using diet pills and getting loaded even more frequently. 

"OSI. I’m talking about the OSI" Brock snapped and pushed the other man against the wall. Sudden closeness between the men made Rusty swallow and start staring at the floor.

“You’ve never asked for a job yourself, Doc. Are you high again or somethin’?" the blond man harshly grabbed Dr. Venture by the chin and pulled his head up to look closely into the eyes, examining the pupils.

"What?! No", the older man shouted, bugging his eyes out at the bodyguard. Rusty’s face expression dramatically turned to a one of a dame, whose dignity had been insulted, so, obviously, Brock released the lock right away.

"Okay", the blond man stepped back and sighed. He still was aggravated and took a minute to ease up the temper. After a short pause he folded his arms mirroring Rusty "So what is it all ‘bout, Doc? You just want a bit of attention, ain’t ya?"

The other man smirked and spun on his heals sharply, passing Brock by with an acrid answer "I don’t need _your_ attention, Brock, I am an adult".

"I wasn’t specifically talking about _my_ attention" the bodyguard stood up to the statement coldly and followed his companion to the living room. Rusty didn’t feel like answering at once because of the evoked embarrassment and regrets inside of him. He hadn’t wanted to take it out on the friend. He had just been too riled up, that was it.

"Listen, Brock,” the scientist calmed down his voice and tried to sound convincing “I’ve been through a lot of shit lately. I am infinitely exhausted inside, although I may not seem that way”. Dr. Venture paused to gather his thoughts. The bodyguard kept walking rhythmically behind Dr. Venture in silence. 

“You know, it feels like I’m stuck in a lame state of lethargy, not being able to move on, to fix all the problems there are. And those problems, they just keep on stacking, and stacking, and stacking… You get what I mean”. He pulled a bottle of antiseptic and bandages from the bathroom cabinet and continued “I guess, I need some time on my own to recover. And maybe I’ll even overcome my everlasting midlife crisis, who knows, right?” the man chuckled with bitter.

Brock just growled, processing the confession, and grabbed the bandage from Rusty’s hands "Gimme that".

He was good at this kind of stuff – taking out bullets, setting bones, dressing wounds... Like any OSI veteran he was very experienced in field medicine, pretty fast and enough neat. It almost didn’t hurt when he was treating the scientist’s hand, holding it firmly but yet carefully.

"But do you really have to be in the middle of nowhere to put yourself together?" the stronger man wondered sitting on the edge of a bathtub. “I mean, didn’t you rack your brains _here_ and make a god damn teleporter?”

"Phhh, don’t you even mention it," Rusty scoffed. "The one of my best high science devices, that appeared to be a bullshit investment of time and money. And even more – it’s ended up in hands of the Guild... Well, partly".

Brock simply nodded in recognition and then glanced at the other man "So... you are serious about that, aren’t ya, Doc?”

“I think, I am…” the scientist answered unconfidently, his voice getting much quieter. “I’ve made a decision, so… yes. Yes, I am serious”.

“Well, okay than” Brock stood up in a harsh movement, like he had finally made up his mind “But I’ll have to stay with the boys”.

Let’s be real here, Rusty hadn’t exactly thought everything out. At some level he did want the bodyguard to come with him, but on the other hand – Brock would probably spend his time away from the scientist hunting the female workers or having fun with other agents. 

“It’s the OSI base, I’ll be fine,” he finally managed and smirked “At least you and the boys could rest from my boring presence”.

There wasn’t much else to say at the moment – Dr. Venture had about an hour and a half to pack his things, and he didn’t even know where exactly he would be going to. In the end he decided to take only this stuff that most definitely wouldn’t be given out as a part of an “OSI temporary worker kit”.

Rusty was in the middle of folding basic clothes in the bag when Hank returned from his first working day. The young man entered the living room with a content smile, he was full of beans – talking about how cool the place was and what dope people he had met. Of course, Dr. Venture was reasonably glad that his son had found a job and had actually enjoyed it but at the same time he couldn’t stop being a bit annoyed. All that babbling was distracting him, and the older son with his attention deficit hadn’t even noticed that his father was intensively packing. Well, it had always been the case with Hank – from time to time the young man was too much into himself, living in his own rose-colored world.

Overall, it took the junior Venture about five more minutes to finish with his day review and then notice Rusty’s activity. Anyway, not like he was much impressed or shocked by the told news – he went for a simple “okay” and retreated to his room.

“Mask,” the scientist whispered to Brock with a pointing nod while Hank was walking away – the bodyguard got this hint instantly and followed the young man. Rusty wasn’t sure how in the hell his son had managed to find the mask in the first place, but it had to be taken away or, preferably, be burnt for Hank’s own good. And for Dean’s as well. 

Speaking of whom – Dr. Venture flopped near the half-stuffed bag to call his youngest son and tell him about the departure and, at the same time, ask about his well-being after the accident. Dean answered almost immediately, everything seemed to be fine as far as it was possible – the boy said that Jared had been a great help and had even promised to keep an eye on the roommate from now on. Although Dean confessed to think the last part had been a little too much.

“Nah, your friend does have a point here, Dean,” Dr. Venture advocated, “New York is full of crazy people. And confused people like, let’s say… _The Bat_. You don’t live with Brock anymore, Dean, so…”

The young man sighed deeply like he was actually the one to be in an infinite loop of bad luck instead of Rusty “I know, pop, but… I don’t want to get too close to new people. I don’t want to… you know, depend on Jared too much”.

“Dean, Dean, Dean,” Dr. Venture shook his head with a slight smile. “But that’s what normal people do. They have friends and they depend on them. Wasn’t it you who wanted to be just a normal average guy?”

The young man on the other side of the screen looked somewhat conflicted “Yes… Yes, I was. But I’m not sure if that’s the same in my case…”

“Okay, Dean,” the scientist cut off not being in the mood to discuss complicated topics that would probably make him conduct amateur psychotherapy “I know you have your standards and morals like vegetarianism and all that crap – but, please... Just stick to your shooting-web-from-his-bum-superhero friend while I’m away, all right? I want you to stay out of trouble. And it’d be completely outrageous to return into a bigger mess than the one I’m already in”.

“Oh… All right then, I guess” the young Venture muttered. “But where are you going, pop? I haven’t heard about this before” Dean wondered with a rather blaming tone like he himself hadn’t chosen to run away from the family and its business to live in a dorm with a “spider man”.

“Of course, you haven’t heard about this – I got the offer like an hour ago” the father answered simply. “It’s the OSI work, they need my help in a project. So, I’ll be away for a week. Don’t know the exact location though, somewhere in the USA – well, I hope for the southern regions”.

“Didn’t you try asking Brock?” the young man suggested softly “I bet he knows that”.

Actually, that was a great idea. Rusty promised himself to use it after finishing with the packing, for which he didn’t have much time left, by the way. So, the scientist wrapped it up with the call and wished Dean a good night.

Ten minutes more and the travel bag was ready. Dr. Venture checked every included item in his mind once again and, satisfied with his choices, sat near, right on the living room’s floor. He leaned the head back on the couch and frowned – the more time passed, the worse Rusty felt about the whole idea. For no particular reason he suddenly wanted to lock himself up in the bedroom and sleep for a week or two – most probably, this state had been caused by the recent emotion outburst. The man sighed, strange hope fleeting in his head - what if Brock had contacted the OSI and withdrawn Doc’s application because… well, because it had been a really stupid idea to apply at the first place?..

Familiar steps echoed through the room, making Dr. Venture’s eyes follow the source of the sound. “So, you’re ready?” the bodyguard asked and approached the other man, who instantly jumped from the floor and dusted his speedsuit.

“Of course, I am,” Rusty answered with annoyance “you didn’t actually think that I would change my mind, did you?”

The other man merely shrugged “Nah, I put up with the idea”. Then he took the bag and threw it over the shoulder effortlessly. “The jet’s already waitin’”.

“Okay, just a second,” Dr. Venture requested and rushed into his bedroom to inspect the cupboard’s content – several speedsuits, shirts, a smoking… Aha, here it was – the old bomber jacket for unexpectedly cold autumns. Obviously, it wouldn’t be enough warm for the winter weather, but Rusty didn’t plan to stay outside for too long. He took the thing off the rag, put it on and got out of the room – Brock had already been waiting near the top-floor stairs.

“What’s that supposed to be?” he squinted at the sight of a neon-green disaster.

“Ah, you just don’t get the fashion” Rusty waved him off and started climbing up to the next floor.

The blond man rolled his eyes and followed “I didn’t mean _that_. Where is your coat?”

“It’s still at the dry cleaners, duh,” Doc spread his arms in helplessness “and also it’s not so cold, after all. I can manage few minutes outside before I get into the jet”.

Brock raised a brow in doubt “Believe me, you wouldn’t want to meet Alaska in this”.

Rusty abruptly stopped, and the bodyguard slightly bumped into him. The scientist looked at the other man with round eyes “Who… is Alaska?”

“It’s a state, Doc!” the taller man snarled and slightly pushed Dr. Venture ahead by the shoulders.

Rusty wasn’t content. He wasn’t content at all. He hated low temperatures, he hated winter – his joints usually started to ache because of freeze, he easily caught a cold and he had a sick tendency to find any tiny piece of ice and slip on it. Although… although all the scientific work would be probably done inside, so Alaska wasn’t a real reason to panic - Dr. Venture calmed himself down and went for logic.

“Doesn’t the OSI give out a kit to its workers with all the necessary stuff?.. I mean, there would probably be a whole winter suit in it”.

“Sure” the bodyguard agreed. “But first you have to walk from the jet to the base, and only after that you’ll get the stuff”.

With that being said, the men stepped out to the rooftop, where the landing pad was located. Instantly Rusty pushed his hat down, feeling the chilly gust of wind trying to take it off. Hank had already been outside and was chatting with the OSI agents – well, probably, more annoying them than chatting. 

“By the way, Doc,” the blond man threw out and the scientist turned around to face him, “I got ya something”. Brock stretched out his hand, a wide bracelet-like device in his palm. Rusty sniffed and hugged himself in attempt to get warmer “Why would I need that?” 

“That’s a secret base, Doc, remember? And your watches have location tracker” the bodyguard explained, and, with a sigh, Dr. Venture took off his mittens and handed over the communicator to get the OSI one in return. He rolled over the sleeve and put the thing on awkwardly, his fingers had been already reddened of the freeze. It seemed the man’s body was completely rejecting the outside reality after staying inside the cozy and temperature-pleasing apartments – he started shivering involuntary and shuffled along.

“Geez, Doc” the blond man breathed out loudly and with one wide movement tossed his coat over the scientist’s shoulders. Rusty petrified, confused with the unexpected act of empathy. Suddenly he felt himself so small – figuratively and literally.

“That…” he stuttered and smiled gawkily “that wasn’t necessary”.

Brock rolled his eyes and moved to the jet. “Don’t wanna you to get sick. Not a fan of all that during-illness naggin’” he replied with slight annoyance, and Dr. Venture smirked pulling the coat closer by its lapels. It smelled nice. 

As two men got to the jet, the OSI agents saluted legendary Brock Samson, who merely nodded to them. Hank at his turn waved a hand with an enthusiastic smile, making Rusty frown.

“Listen, Hank,” the father fixed his glasses, that was a usual sign of further serious conversation “I really don’t have money at the moment for any of your crazy ideas”.

“Oh, come on! I’ve just wanted to see you off like a good son that I am,” the young man assured with a theatrical voice, placing hands on his chest.

“Hmmm,” Rusty raised a brow “okay, that’s good for me”.

“Huh,” Hank pointed a finger at Dr. Venture. “Why are you wearing Brock’s coat?..” his voice had a slight tone of a childish displeasure, like it was only Hank’s privilege to wear something that belonged to the bodyguard.

“Oh, well, Hank, the answer is very simple” the older man smirked “because _someone_ has ruined mine”.

Rusty’s son sharply raised his eyes to the sky with faked interest and whistled “Wow, the weather is really bringin’ it”. He wasn’t the one to drop the subject smoothly. 

At the same time in the corner of his eyes Rusty noticed Brock throwing the bag into the luggage compartment like it was a feather. He rubbed his arms together in a “job-is-done” way and turned back to Rusty “So, that’s it, Doc. You’re ready to go”.

“Yes, yes” the smaller man tossed his palm to the side, “you all just want me to leave as soon as possible”. Knowing there wouldn’t be any answer to his bitter remark that obviously was only for the show, Dr. Venture approached the airstairs and leaned on the railing.

“Try not to destroy everything while I am away” he addressed to both men, “and Hank, for God’s sake, stop doing whatever you are doing to your brother”. Staring critically at his bodyguard and son Rusty suddenly understood that there was no actual point at reading them lectures at the moment. He simply gave it up and started climbing the stairs, slightly shaking head in disapproval.

“Bye, pop!” Hank shouted, waving a hand, and Rusty turned around to wave him back but in a more slackly way. Inevitably his eyes gravitated to the Brock’s face – the man was looking back with an unreadable expression. 

“Hey, Doc” he called out nonchalantly and then grinned “Have fun”.

Rusty smirked at the mocking comment and folded his arms. “Yeah, whatever,” he mumbled in return.

***

The aircraft was swiftly raising higher and higher, and as the familiar figures on the Tower’s rooftop had become completely indistinguishable, Dr. Venture felt a sharp seizure of loneliness. Realization of the upcoming week without the family was merely an occasion for such a downcast mood, the real reason was more complicated. Rusty had been constantly and most often subliminally missing the times when they all had been a little closer - New York seemed to build a huge wall between Dr. Venture and his family, but there was something more to it. People’s bad choices. His bad choices.

The flight from New York to Alaska took about five hours on the OSI super jet, and for most of the journey Rusty had been sleeping. The last time he awoke in the cabin, they were going down for the landing. Outside the window the pitch-black sky was spangling with stars, orange lights of the lane and the base beneath it. Snow was everywhere. Lots of and lots of snow. The endless fields of snow, surrounded by mountains.

The aircraft had landed, and before stepping outside of it Rusty had wrapped himself up warm and had hoped it would help not to die out of freeze. They were going to get to the base on snowmobiles. He hated those and, obviously, considered a snowmobile to be one of the most dangerous and badly controlled vehicles. No surprise, that the scientist was clinging to the agent-driver like a rabid cat despite of the other man’s occasional grunting. Of course, Rusty himself didn’t find it pleasurable to lean to some guy he had literally met for the first time that exact day, but it was the matter of trust. And also, cold. A driver was a big meat warmer. 

Ten minutes more from the landing lane to the destination left Dr. Venture with full awareness of the fact that Brock’s coat had definitely saved him from frostbite. In the facility, however, he was provided with a uniform for the inside and the outside like he had assumed. After that Rusty met with the project manager to discuss the details of Venture’s part in the whole thing – and at man’s honest surprise he had been appointed to a position of a team leader. Apparently, the invention of a teleporter had changed the OSI’s opinion on Rusty’s capabilities – and with this thought his pitiful self-esteem raised a little. 

Although, after brief introduction of his group members Rusty felt rather betrayed - the three other scientists looked even more pathetic than he did. There were a mummy-old woman, the pride holder of bushy mustaches; a short overweight kid with sights of hormonal problems on his face; and a crippled middle-aged man that had an eye-tic and shudder. Dr Venture greeted them with a sour face, left his stuff in a personal locker and followed the assigned agent farther.

"What a dream-team," he muttered after entering the hall with his arms crossed.

The other man just smirked and continued walking along with the large quick steps. Fortunately, Rusty didn’t need to make an effort to keep up with him because, despite of the rather short stature he had pretty long legs. Soon enough the agent stopped before another door and pressed his keycard to the panel.

"And that’s the examination room, Dr. Venture" he said letting the scientist go ahead.

"What kind of examination?.." Rusty asked and turned back - the door had already been closed and the agent - gone. A red light on the panel indicated - he was locked.

“All kinds of examination, Dr. Venture,” the voice from behind assured.

***

At the end of the evening the scientist was exhausted physically and emotionally by all the paper work and health tests. Quite possibly, the only thing that had kept him going through the day was the ability to call his family for, basically, bitching. And the lucky man for the position was Brock, of course - who else could comfort Rusty in a situation like this.

"Hey, Doc" the blond man’s face appeared on the watches screen. He was wearing a usual face of boredom. "Whazup?"

Rusty frowned with suspicion “Wait, why aren’t you sleeping? Isn’t it like… two something AM in New York?”

“Emm…” the blond man hesitated to answer but after few seconds asked back hemming, “so, was it your intention to wake me up or what?” 

“Well, no,” Rusty waved a hand with annoyance “I haven’t really thought about it before. Anyway, I didn’t wake you up, so we’re good. And now I really need to talk to you because otherwise I won’t be able to sleep”.

Brock’s face didn’t change much at the demanding request, like he had been expecting a similar answer. “Okay. So?” he shortly agreed to supply his ears.

“Brock. It is fucking ridiculous”, Rusty shook the head with indignation. “My team is made of a def walrus, pimple-face wombat and unstable camel, for cry it out loud! I’m working at the zoo!.. At the god damn zoo! And I even had a thought that maybe the OSI had decided to give me a chance after all – but nay, good stuff is not for Rusty fuckin’ Venture”.

“Just look at the brighter side. You are a team leader, at least” Brock shrugged.

Rusty rolled his eyes. “I am a zoo keeper,” he protested desperately. 

“I’m sure the OSI wouldn’t hire useless people. Give them some time. Maybe they aren’t so bad” Brock’s voice, as always, sounded confident and in some way calming. 

“Yes, yes, I know, you’re right and all. But it seems kind of unfair – people from the other teams look more… human” Rusty sighed and sat down on the stairs somewhere in the far part of the base where no one was roaming around at the time.

“And what’s about those multiple examinations?..” Rusty definitely had more things up his sleeve to complain about. “I could have just brought my doctor’s conclusion. Various blood test, psychotherapist, prostate check-up, cardiac workload control… Am I going to the Moon or what?”

“Hah, you haven’t been in a game for a long time, Doc” the blond man smirked “That’s pretty much a standard policy”.

“Standard policy my ass”, Rusty snapped back tiredly.

It didn’t take long for the conversation to come to an end, and after that Dr. Venture felt himself much better. Needless to say, that he felt asleep as soon as he flopped on the bed, lacking the energy for any reflection. 


	4. One more step to sort it out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kind of Brock's POV this time. Some Dean and Hank moments at the end (brotherly).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter isn't very long)  
> Please, write me privatly to correct any mistakes. Hope, you'll like the chapter  
> \---  
> Guys! I've made a lot of corrections for this chapter.  
> I posted the original one yesterday at night. Obviously, it was full of stupid mistakes. Oopsie. Soory for that! Hope, it's better now.

Life was boring. Painfully boring.

The Blackout team incident was a one-off thing among the series of similarly tedious days. And when there was no action, no job for Brock’s hands to do - then his mind started acting weird, bringing all the repressed scraps of thoughts back to light. And those, well, those spawned unwanted sensations. You may call this condition a mid-life crisis, if you wish.

Anyway, the constant feeling of unresolved issues was truly getting on Brock’s nerves lately, pissing him off. All because the man didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand what issues they were exactly. Few times he caught himself considering settling down, starting a family – but that wasn’t it, in the end he swept the idea away completely. He had already had the family, which needed his support and his attention, and which provided some kind of stability and comfort in return. The bodyguard wouldn’t want to have any other one. An average family with a pleasing housewife and complaisant kids instead of the disastrous scientist and his restless offsprings? No, thank you. Brock liked it crazy.

And a woman being a constant partner – it wasn’t his cup of tea either. Samson was a wild machine of murder and sex, at least many people that didn’t know him well thought that way. At some instance they were right – he did like to kill as well as he did like to fuck. He enjoyed his independence in those things. You can even say, independence in relationship was his credo, especially because of Cocktease – he couldn’t trust women anymore and, actually, he hadn’t ever found any other woman except for the Russian ex-spy to captivate his heart. Usually curvaceous ladies awoken the only thing inside of him – lust. And, as a real man, he was okay with that.

For the very same reason Brock had always left a woman satisfied with his prodigious skills. Although, no one of his recent lady-friends had even noticed that, forsooth, something had changed. Something _was_ changing. For Brock sex wasn’t the same. It became more of a physically relieving habit, that didn’t have much in common with passion he had used to pour out. This discovery made the OSI agent chose jerking off over getting laid lately – the former seemed easier, when he simply wasn’t in the mood to go out and hit on women, or when he wanted to stay close to the Ventures in case of possible emergency.

At the same time, he deliberately was trying not to recall the haunted image of Rusty on the OSI virtual-slash-narcotic-reality chair. The whole thing was disturbing, humiliating and gross… and, confusingly, suggestive. Just the weirdest thing ever.

The very best option to erase the unholy vision was to avoid any private interactions with Dr. Venture if possible. Plainly saying, Brock was mostly staying away from Doc in his spare time, although within a walking distance. For example, he tended to spend several hours per day at the OSI office.

"Well, well, well," Shore Leave placed his hands on the hips womanly as Brock stepped into the room "Look who’s left the family nest again" he greeted with tease.

"Ha, I’ve already heard this one" the blond man smirked and joined a little group of veterans.

As usual agent’s topics of conversation varied from the top-secret missions to the bathroom stories – you could never get bored here. Well, maybe you could, but only if all the old-school agents were away except from Snoopy.

The highlight of the evening appeared to be Sky Pilot’s narration of his latest task. It contained everything an adventurous man would like to experience – chasing, watching explosions, jumping with parachute, villains’ elimination… But, thank heavens, Brock had encountered Guild agents the previous day, so he didn’t feel too much left out from a thrill and shared his story too. It was a delight to recollect enemies faces full of terror and despair, while for the bodyguard himself it had just been pure entertainment.

The man was vividly describing various killing techniques he had used, when the general marched out of his room and interrupted the speech. “Samson,” he called out with a hoarse voice. “What in the hell’s wrong with your twig-buddy?”

“Um,” Brock drawled with perplexity, “whatcha mean?..”

Gathers chewed on the mouthpiece with a hem “Remember Alaska project I’ve mentioned recently? The rookie mission, that one”. The man folded his arms and raised up a chin to look more imposing like he was playing a role in a cliché action movie “Well. Dr. Venture’s signed up for that crap, Sunshine”. 

Brock had almost choked on his own tongue at the news, the expression on his face turning from stunned to unreadable. The freshly reported fact wasn’t the one to be comprehend easily, because the last time Rusty willingly asked to participate in this kind of work (it had been, actually, military order) had been… what, no less than ten years ago, maybe?.. Any way, it wasn’t in Doc’s character to commit things like that anymore, especially after he had become the over-proud owner of VenTech. Something smelled fishy for sure.

"Lizzy said he was acting kind of weird, Samson," the general related and slapped himself on the neck.

“Well, I guess, I’d… eem, better check up on him then” Brock announced with a dull voice, buried in his thoughts. At the moment he was hardly seeing the other agents, but was rather looking right through them, like they were nothing more than furniture.

Shore Leave dramatically rolled his eyes and raised both hands as Samson passed him by in a badly hidden hurry "Yikes, problems in paradise!"

***

“Acting weird” wasn’t a good descriptive phrase, not good at all. And in Gathers’ mouth it sounded more like “being high”. Brock folded his arms with annoyance - he was standing in the elevator, waiting for it to go up to the last level, his foot tapping on the metal floor. The man was going through all the probabilities of Doc being high - scientific accident, alcohol, drugs… Due to the state he had left Rusty back in the lobby, the correct answer was probably between the last two options.

As the elevator’s doors opened and the bodyguard stepped outside – his nose was instantly attacked by a saccharine odor, which surprisingly resembled a terrible grape soda that Doc had recently been bonkers for. A second later and the blond man could clearly distinguish nervous breathing on his right side – without doubting he turned head that way.

A sight of the slightly shivering scientist that was sitting with his ass straight on the floor gave Brock one more reason to believe, the man wasn’t clean. And Samson was annoyed. Irritated. Steaming. He had a good memory of how high dose of “diet pills” had affected Dr. Venture – that hadn’t been a pretty or funny scene to witness. This addiction supposed to stay back in the past.

"What the fuck, Doc?!" the bodyguard attacked Rusty who slowly started raising up from the floor. The blond man moved closer and listened to the uninformative response - not getting a proper one after a minute or so, Brock pushed the scientist next to the wall, determined to find out everything by himself. Boldly he grabbed Rusty’s face and lifted man’s head up. He needed to examine Venture’s state – specific smells, pupils, muscle motions, anything that could tell what Doc had taken… However, soon enough it was obvious that Rusty hadn’t been high, but rather shocked or exasperated. And, recklessly, the taller man’s eyes slipped down and lingered in other man’s lips for a second too long, catching him deeply breathing out with a strangely pleasing anxiety.

One more moment had passed and Dr. Venture was yelling back, outraged by his companion’s accusation. Apparently, he was taking quitting drugs quite seriously and personally, which Brock hadn’t really thought about. And exactly than the blond man realized he was a way too close to Rusty, practically few inches away from the scientist’s face. Something heavy pounded inside the bodyguard’s chest and the man stepped aside abruptly, not willing to explore what had just happened to him.

Long story short, thirty minutes later after Brock had helped the scientist with the wound and had left him packing, the blond man walked outside to the huge open area, where the pool was located, and leaned on the glass door, overlooking the snowy city glittering with lights. He just wanted to light up a cigarette and take a one hell long of a drag, but he was trying to quit. For no particular reason, of course.

Although there had been one time recently when Rusty hadn’t demanded but had rather suggested the bodyguard to give up this bad habit. He hadn't been able hide a real concern in his voice, even with typical sarcasm.

"We are not getting younger, Brock. And you are not immortal” the shorter man had said. “I don’t want my bodyguard to die of a lung cancer - how lame would that be".

"Ha, ya must quit all those fancy cocktails of yours then, Doc" the bodyguard had replied and had put out his half-way done cigarette.

Yes, they still did have good times together. Although, it was easier to forget about the confusion and act normally when someone else was presented nearby. Brock sighed, white steam slowly coming out of his mouth – he couldn’t lie to himself anymore. Affirmatively, he got some sexual attraction to a male yet again. The only previous case had been long time ago and, well, actually, it was thought to be just a teenage confusion, a brief stage of famous bi-curiosity.

So, after all, maybe it was a good idea for Brock to stay in New York and get his head straight, with Rusty working in Alaska. The bodyguard would be able to fix himself, to return back into a safe and familiar place – it had worked before, it would work this time. In any event, this sprung-up tension must have been just a temporary insanity caused by New York’s pollution, or “God gas”, or women interaction shortage, or everything at the same time… which meant, that this tension would go away sooner or later.

*** 

“Here are your files, Mr. Samson,” a red-head woman glanced at Brock, who was leaning casually on the high white desk at the OSI office. She gave him a cute smile and slid the folder forward.

“Thanks, Lizzy,” the man grinned back reflexively, trying to grab the papers, but she didn’t let go so easily.

The woman curled a lock on her forefinger with suggestion and proceeded “You know that you don’t have to do it, right?”. Her lips bent into a wide smile “Venture is on the OSI mission, he’s not your problem for now. So… you are free to do whatever you want”. She batted her eyelashes and let go of the folder, moving closer to the desk.

The bodyguard looked at Lizzy up and down one more time – full lips, impressing cleavage, tight ass. She was a kind of gal to go to town right on the working desk with a guy she really liked, and, well, Brock was that guy. Sure, if he was in the mood, he would gladly take the chance, however…However he still was sorting things out and he genuinely wanted to study the project – it never hurt to be prepared for the worst. Yeap, he also kind of cared for the scientist. 

“I take my job seriously, sugar” he finally answered and picked up the files. “And Doc is whole lotta trouble”.

Examining dossiers and base plans wasn’t the most interesting thing ever, but it kept Brock’s mind occupied, while he was waiting for Rusty to call him, which would inevitably happen. It was funny how some things never changed with the scientist and could be easily foreseen by Brock, like Rusty calling him thoughtlessly after midnight. And all together there were also times when Dr. Venture was capable to shock his bodyguard even after long years spent together. 

Anyway, the next thing Brock knew – his communicator beeped annoyingly, informing about an incoming call. A familiar face on the screen insensibly made man’s lips curve in a smallest smile possible – he was glad to see that the scientist was safe and sound.

“Wait, why aren’t you sleeping?” Rusty had asked with a slight suspicion in his voice. “Isn’t it like… two something AM in New York?”

After that question Brock’s expression instantly changed to confusion. Indeed, why had he deliberately decided not to switch off the watches and go to sleep but to wait for Dr. Venture to bring petty complains down on him?.. That was a strange choice, and the scientist didn’t need to figure this out, so Brock expertly flipped things around, and for ten minutes more he was listening to Doc’s bleats about the first day at the base. He hadn’t even started working and it had already been a whole tragedy for the man, apparently – well, at least Brock knew where Dean’s sensitivity had come from.

“So, this is it?” the bodyguard asked in the end, when there was nothing much to add up. “Ya ready to go bye-bye now?” 

“Yeah, I’m pretty exhausted,” the other man sighed dramatically. “Thanks for the coat, by the way. It was… helpful”.

“Oh, that… that’s nothin’,” Brock didn’t really expect to hear that from Doc - the man hardly expressed gratitude to anyone. But it was nice.

The call shortly ended, leaving Brock in a sitting position on the bed. The man smirked to himself – Rusty would probably run away from Alaska in a day or two, and that actually wouldn’t be such a bad thing. 

***

Next morning Brock was having his breakfast alone - Hank had an early shift at work and, surprisingly, hadn’t missed the time. Dean didn’t have any lectures, but stayed at the dorm. Hell, the boys did grow up fast.

H.E.L.P.eR. beeped cheerfully and poured some coffee into the mug, invigorating aroma coming out of it.

"Ya know, I practically have nothin’ to do this days" Brock said more to himself than to the robot. "I fuckin’ hope, the Guild will finally assign an enemy to Doc when he returns".

The helper beeped once again with his hands going up and down, slightly spilling coffee from the pot.

"Come on, Monarch is not a bad option" Brock brushed the robot off and raised his hand to check on the watches – someone was calling him.

The man froze instantly at the scene happening on the little screen. There was something highly odd and pleasantly hypnotizing in the way Rusty looked: heavy panting, reddened face, drops of sweat on his forehead... It didn’t take long for Brock to discover he was just a second away from having awfully inappropriate thoughts about his male-friend. And that was the exact opposite of what he wanted to achieve during the "vacation" days.

“That’s complete madness,” the scientist hissed into the screen and Brock couldn’t agree more. “They are making us do exercises and freaking jogging. What else haven’t you told me about?”

“Oh, come on, stop givin’ me attitude,” the man dug his fingernails into the thigh to refocus attention. “It was your idea, Doc. Ya wanted to get away from the Big Apple’s problems and deal with shit in your head, didn’t ya?”

“Eeeem… right, I did” Rusty agreed, a bold expression suddenly disappearing from his face – the bodyguard had probably sounded way too edgy.

“So, do that,” Brock breathed out heavily. “And there is no need to call me every other hour, Doc. I’m not your chatting girlfriend or somethin’, all right?”

“Oookay,” the scientist’s brows shifted closer making him look rather perplexed or, perhaps, a bit upset. “That’s… that’s a fair point, I guess” he chuckled nervously. “You know, I’d… yeah, I’d better go now. More circles are waiting to be run in”.

The call ended pretty fast as had been planned - seriously, Brock couldn’t keep a straight face for too long having a semi caused by the calling person. After the talk had been over the man sharply leaned on the chair’s back, staring at nothing. "I’m not doing this" he reassured himself with his teeth clenched and then repeated this mantra several times in a row.

"I’m fuckin’ doing it", he whispered hoarsely standing in the shower and stroking his length.

Well, well, well. If Brock had accepted having a bit of sexual tension caused by Dr. Venture before the accident, then after it he had to admit this tension being anything but little. Usually, in alike situations, the blond man fought fire with fire, namely he banged with the female of his desire and it was all it took to never think of this female again. The different case was, of course, Cocktease, who simply hadn’t let Brock to practice his methods on her and, therefore, had been stuck in the man’s head for a painfully long time. In a way, Rusty was a different case too – he was freaking Rusty Venture, for fuck sake. Not only a male, but also Brock’s necessary friend and his ward. There just had to be another way out of that hell of a whole new ball game for the bodyguard. And till he found it out, he had another mission to accomplish.

***

The family, which wasn’t fully complete at the time, was marching along the grand center mall. Hank and Dean were separated by Brock but clearly still didn’t fell too comfortable in each other’s company. 

“I don’t care what’s going on between you two, boys,” the bodyguard confessed, “but I promised your dad to help ya buying suits”.

Hank threw his head back and emitted a groan “I don’t even wanna go to this stupid whatever-fancy-dancing event it is”.

“That’s a charity ball,” Dean corrected quietly, his eyes glued to the floor. Hank didn’t even bother to mock his brother as he had used to do, and the younger twin bit his lip.

“Yet again,” Brock sighed. “I don’t care. You both agreed to this. So, you both ain’t leaving till you got descent suits”.

This event was an annual thing and, according to the Pirate, very important for business one, so Rusty had confronted his sons about this charity evening in advance. Eventually, he had accepted twin’s terms of a bargain and had kept his part of the deal. And it was time for Hank and Dean to start fulfilling their promises too.

So, all three men of the group were going up on an escalator to the fourth floor when suddenly Brock’s communicator bleeped. The man shortly raised his arms to check a notification. “Hm, I need to return to the OSI office, boys,” he said slowly. “Sorry, you’ll have to do this alone”.

He patted the twins on their shoulders with a short smile and, after they had arrived to the level, moved back down. Dean anxiously rubbed his hand still looking under the feet and, making a deep sigh, came to a decision to apologize to the brother again - when he was conscious this time. The young man lifted his head up and, at his surprise, didn’t see Hank anywhere near.

“Em, Hank?..” he called out and moved forward in hope to spot the man.

“Ha, not so fast, pretty boy,” the factitiously deep voice warned, and its owner wrapped his arm around Dean’s neck, so the latter couldn’t really see the attacker. “I am the Devil Bird! Very evil and, may I suggest, yummy villain, that…”

Not waiting for another word to be said, young Venture smashed his dandy shoe’s heel into the bigger man’s foot, who instantly yipped and started jumping around on one leg in pain. “Ouch, you are growing on me, Dean,” Devil Bird whispered and turned to the other man only to get pepper spray in his eyes. “Oh, Jesus Christ!.. I didn’t agree to that!” he exclaimed rubbing his watery eyes.

Obviously, Dean panicked and after preforming reflex actions of aggressive self-defense, he didn’t hesitate to super-run away, screaming for help, completely forgetting about the watches.

He was trotting on the third level to the next escalator, constantly looking back to check if the attacker was chasing after him – but he wasn’t. The young Venture had almost calmed himself down to act sensible when he heard the sound of people screaming and sudden cracking at his right, just in a tick he turned his head that way only to be a helpless witness of his own assault.

A formless glob of supervillain muscles and grease flew right through the shop’s window and into Dean, making him fall over the railing. Thankfully, he managed to clutch on the banner and at the time was desperately trying to hold onto it, although the lack of physical activities had its effect.

“What the fuck is going on there?!.. And who the hell is this guy?!” a familiar voice roared and the young man turned his head up to ascertain that it belonged to Brock. And as their eyes met, Dean’s fingers treacherously started sliding off and in a second he was falling down.

The bodyguard leaned over the railing, pure fright in his eyes. And then he saw someone familiar down there, hope rising inside of him “Come on, Hank!” the bodyguard shouted. “You can do it!”

On the first floor, right above the falling man, Hank was standing, the bat mask dangling from his neck. The man had stretched his arms and had slightly bent his knees in attempt to catch the twin - he couldn’t let Dean die, not after all they’d been thought together. Dean was his confused sweet little brother. 

As the weight of a young adult met with Hank’s arms, he staggered a little but didn’t lost the balance. Brock looked at the twins with proud and great relief and, afterwards, joined Devil Bird in beating up the villain who had ruined their plans.

“Hank, you are my hero,” Dean confessed, his eyes shiny with badly pent-up tears. “I’m so sorry… I’m such an awful brother, I’m disgusting”.

Still holding other man in his arms, Hank simply nodded “We’ll figure this out, bro”. 


	5. The day Y

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More of Brock POV. Swearing.  
> \+ Hank, Dean and Jared; the Monarch, Mrs. My Wife and Gary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for waiting, guys! <3  
> Sometimes it's hard to be in the mood for writing. BTW kudos help ^_- And even not registred users can leave one!  
> ***  
> If you find mistakes - write me a private message.  
> If you want more interactions between additional pairings or certain cute scenes in the fic - you can suggest ur ideas.  
> Much love!

The “vacation” week was a downer – all because it was literally a vacation. No enemies to protect the Tower from, no more problems between the brothers, no crazy Doc’s inventions that were about to destroy the world – no nothing.

On Tuesday morning Brock found himself in the kitchen with the only company of H.E.L.P.eR again – Hank had thrown the breakfast down his throat with lightning speed and had left for work.

Almost dead silence laid upon the apartment, interrupted by robot’s listless beeping from time to time. Brock growled tiredly. For him it simply felt wrong not to hear lively chatter between the son and the father, not to throw his two cents in their silly disputes.

Naturally, the bodyguard finished his meal as soon as possible, he got dressed and took an elevator to the first floor. There were several basic things the man usually did as a part of his daily job routine like checking security cameras or striding across the key levels of the building. That day wasn’t an exception.

When Brock was done with the watch, he moved to the OSI office in hope of getting any side mission available, so he wouldn’t have to be stuck in the empty apartment the whole week. However, all the minor tasks had already been taken and other ones needed much more time and planning. It was a disappointment but, what the hell, Brock surly could found some other things to do for self-entertainment. Even if those things were mostly typical bachelor’s activities.

So, yeah, that’s how the days went from Tuesday to Saturday for the blond man – he hang out with his fellow agents a lot, when they were chilling at the office, hooked up with Lizzy several times, organized a big cleanup at home (during which he found some things he would rather not think about), visited a local bar thrice and even started practicing therapeutic painting again. Once he stayed at the José’s garage to witness Hank, his new friend and H.E.L.P.eR trying to perform as a band, but determined on giving them more time for practicing before the next audition.

Nevertheless, as boring as it may sound, the most common thing for the bodyguard to do was watching stupid shows and movies. And as a true gentleman Brock didn’t move on to the new episodes of his favorite TV series, because he had always watched them with Doc. It was quite fun to see Rusty’s reaction and then to debate on stuff. And if being honest, the scientist managed to make things just a little bit more spiced-up with his presence, although he was a huge asshole most of the time.

Speaking of the devil, Dr. Venture hadn’t contacted the bodyguard for three days successively, which seemed fishy. So, contrary to his own words, Brock had been the one to call first, getting involved into scientist’s life.

The man on the other side of the screen looked a bit tired with light shadow under his eyes and stubble spreading outside the beard area. But that was an expected sight – Rusty had never been a person to get used to new schedule right away. Besides from that, he seemed to be doing relatively fine, although the scientist himself claimed surviving in the base being a challenge. Which wasn’t much of a surprise either.

As Brock had discovered in advance, the base in Alaska wasn’t exactly controlled by the OSI, but rather by the alliance of it and the military forces. No wonder Doc’s life had been meticulously planned - most of the time had been devoted to work, of course, then having meals in a shared dining room and doing exercises in the morning, all that under the supervision. Finally, there were about four hours for whatever – two after lunch and two before lights out. Brock could only imagine how tedious life like that would be, so he instantly decided for himself that his time passing was actually nice at the comparison. The man couldn’t put a finger on the fact of Dr. Venture continuing to endure all the inconvenience and not trying to bail. 

Anyway, the bodyguard had managed to call Rusty exactly at the afternoon break (well, most probably, because he knew the schedule by heart), on which the older man had been doing nothing exciting. As far as Brock had been able to see – a moment ago the scientist had been sleeping with his head on the lab table, albeit Rusty himself had mentioned to ponder some old VenTech’s blueprints. In any case, Brock’s mood had been certainly getting better during the talk, especially when he had stopped suppressing all the sudden tingles of his and had embraced them instead. There was nothing sexual about those sensations, on the contrary, bodyguard’s feelings were merely of a platonic kind. This warm affection that Brock had always had for Rusty deep inside was starting to come out, almost unnoticeably for the man himself. Needless to say, from this moment on the bodyguard wasn’t averse to call Doc occasionally.

***

That morning Brock had awakened earlier than usual - perhaps, because of the weird anticipation he had - it was the last Sunday to be crossed out from a calendar, Rusty’s week in Alaska had finally come to its end.

When the man walked in the kitchen, domestically wearing a robe over striped boxers, Hank had already been at the table, having cereals. Brock joined him with a confused greeting.

"Already up?" he asked raising a brow and shoveled his mug to H.E.L.P.eR.

"Yeah”, the young man answered, a loud yawn following shortly. “José says it’s a standard schedule for probation. Still can’t get used gettin’ up early thought".

The bodyguard had always been a little slow in the mornings prior to having his coffee, so it took him a moment to start doubting the situation "Wait a sec. This so-called José makes you work on weekends, ain’t he?" The man cracked his knuckles, inwardly imagining what he would do with the Mexican. “You want me to talk to him?”

“Thanks, Brock, no need in that,” the young man pushed an empty bowl away. “I’ve asked to work today instead of Monday. Since, you know, pop is coming back that Monday”.

“Aaah,” visible excitement in the older man’s posture instantly shifted to sloppiness. “Too bad. I’m dying to kick some asses already”. 

Hank leaned further on the table and hollered “Exactly!”, which made Brock look at him with somewhat concern.

“You know,” the young Venture shrugged, “things got pretty boring here. That’s why I’m not missing any action when pop arrives”.

A tiny smile of pride laid on the bodyguard face as he had recognized himself in Hank yet again. One couldn’t deny, that the more time passed, the more things in common two men tended to have – Hank was becoming a real man, who Brock would be unabashed to call a son. Although, he technically couldn’t.

In any case, despite the bodyguard’s own hope, the Guild kept dragging the assignment of Dr. Venture’s archnemesis. It was only logical to suggest that The Monarch was holding on to the position tightly, but still couldn’t officially get it for whatever reason.

*** 

“Oh, Pookums, could you stay at home today, please?” the supervillain pleaded with fluttering eyelashes. “We could watch romantic movies, or go out. Or maybe spend the whole day in the bed”.

The council woman smiled indulgently but didn’t stop putting her coat on. “Honey, you know that I can’t,” she answered softly. “I have a job to do. Why don’t you finish the application for arching instead?”

“Already done,” Gary yelled from the other room. The Monarch only grinned uneasily, springing his index fingers against each other.

“Well, all that left is to get his consent then, sweety,” the woman stated and, noticing some anxiety in husband’s behavior, came closer, placing her palms on his chest. “Oh, don’t you worry. You were a model supervillain. I’m sure Dr. Venture would be glad to have such a great nemesis back”.

“I know, Honey Bunny, but…” the man’s sentence was interrupted by a fleeting kiss on the forehead, after the Guild car had honked near the porch. Dr. Mrs. The Monarch waved her hand goodbye to the guys and ran outside.

The supervillain sighed heavily and sat on the stairs in the hall. It hadn’t been the first time his dear wife hadn’t understood him, hadn’t paid enough attention to him, hadn’t listened to him. Damn, it had been way easier in the past, when he had been the boss and they had got all the time in the world.

“Dude,” the Monarch heard familiar voice and turned his head up to see Gary sitting on the stairs near him. The man was wearing a tight t-shirt and sweat pants, a plate of cookies in his hand. He stretched out the arm offering the treat and wondered “So, why don’t you make an appointment with Venture anyway?”

The taller man grabbed one of the cookies hesitantly and leaned on his elbow. His wide thin brows curved downwards making the face look even more sad and frustrated than the Monarch probably was. “I have no idea, Gary... He is my blood brother. The closest relative that I have. Do I really want to arch him?.. I don’t know anymore”. 

Number Two had been aware of his boss being a sensitive man and had been expecting something similar to happen. But for all he knew the Monarch was the Monarch due to his obsession with Dr. Venture. And what would happen to him without that hate was unknown, so Gary just couldn’t risk it to find out. He couldn’t take a chance on the Monarch breaking down, quitting arching and loosing himself. So, the man simply hugged his friends with gentle hands and tried to cheer him up “Dude, I understand that all of this must be super confusing, but just think about that – you’ve been hating Dr. Venture since, like, college or what. You’ve always had that natural loathing for him, that most of villains can only dream of. So, there is no way your hate would disappear just because you’ve got to know your enemy is your brother”.

The Monarch fidgeted on his place, thinking over Gary’s arguments. The other man should have been right. But was he though? 

***

“Don’t expect too much, Hank,” Brock advised and finally brought the mug close to his face, invigorating aroma tickling his nostrils. “As far as I know the Guild hasn’t assigned any nemesis to your father yet”.

“Shit, that’s fucking lame,” the young Venture groused and shot his eyes to the bodyguard, who was sitting still with a stiff face. “What?.. I thought I could swear when pop isn’t home”.

Brock exhaled breathy and looked at his mug with pure disgust. For him starting morning with a nice cup of coffee had become habitual necessity, but making a generous gup of _that_ swill had been a terrible mistake.

“Is that… cofix?!” the bodyguard turned to the robot, demand in his eyes. Instantly H.E.L.P.eR raised his arms in complete terror and started rolling around, annoyingly beeping in self-defense.

“Well, I don’t fuckin’ care” Brock replied with his pitch slightly going up. “I dunno what I’ll do if this thing gives me freakin’ farts”.

The uncharted threat induced the robot to double his efforts in making a scene - Hank plugged his ears with a grimace of pain and silently retreated from the kitchen, while Brock tried to scream over manic H.E.L.P.eR “Calm the fuck down! I buy it myself!.. What?.. No! I’m not gonna disassemble you and make a coffee machine of your parts, Jesus!”

Well, that was a bracing start of the day for Samson for sure. Riled up by the hassle, he hardly checked on the Tower’s safety status and headed to the nearest supermarket instead. It may sound surprising, but housekeeping had always settled the man down and had eased his mind in a way. So, shortly after, he walked out of the store with an improved mood, big paper bags in both his hands. The way home didn’t bring negative thinking either - contrariwise, man’s thoughts were inadvertently going back to Rusty. Brock had been waiting for the reunion like a kid for Christmas, but instead of presents he craved for troubles the scientist would eventually bring. Not mentioning the obsessive desire to call Doc’s fully grown-out beard an ugly loofah right into his face, skipping that fact of it being quite decent, and just watch his reaction. What can I say, Brock liked his scientist with a typical chin strap goatee. 

After returning to the apartment and placing all the groceries to their places, the bodyguard had to check one more habitual thing in the list – that’s why he came up to the Dummy Corp’s floor without further delay. His OSI buddies had probably been waiting for him to appear anyway.

Stepping inside the resting room, where the boys usually gathered, Brock suddenly felt a strange cloud of unease in the air – with his appearance other agents abruptly stopped the discussion and tried to change the topic without suspicion. Which they had failed.

"Okay, guys, what’s going on?" Samson asked calmly moving further across the room. "You understand that I’ll find it out eventually, don’t you?" he proceeded with light warning notes in his tone.

For few seconds straight other agents were exchanging looks, mentally telling each other “Nope, not me. You”, and then Shore Leave sighed loudly with his eyes rolling "Okay, big boy, but promise that you won’t get all handsy on me, okay?"

"Deal," the man scoffed and folded up arms, frowning. “So, what is it? Has something happened in Alaska or what?”

“Oh, no-no-no,” the other agent waved in a feminine manner. “Don’t worry, nothing _that_ bad,” he rocked his hip to the right and placed a hand on it. “Anyway, remember that guy, Danny Puff-Puff?”

Brock face tensed in a wink at the mention of the god-damn name. No doubt, he remembered Danny-mother-fucking-Puff-Puff, the sneaky sonuvabitch, that had screwed him over back in the day. Ever since that Brock had waited to encounter the bastard again and show who was the real deal after all – meaning, to beat the shit out of him and probably kill. But he was sneaky as hell, one never knew where he was and what he was about.

“Yes,” the blond man hissed. “Why?”

“Weeeeeell” Shor Leave drawled slowly raising hands in front of his chest, “it appears, he figured in our recent mission, which you had been declined to be in”.

Brock clenched his fist, plain hate drawn on his face. “Damn it,” he whispered to himself and the other man placed hands up higher to cover his face theatrically.

“Aaaaand Headshot’s actually finished him,” he blurted out. The cocky man Shore Leave had just mentioned instantly jumped up with an expression of being betrayed written across his face.

“What the hell, man?.. You weren’t supposed to say that!” the blond shouted out bitterly and then came closer to the embodiment of a threat.

“Listen, Brock… I didn’t know it was him,” Headshot’s pitch raised up slightly and his eyes were running around. “If I knew it was him, I wouldn’t do that, I swear!.. But he wore a god-damn mask and… and he was an obstacle in our mission. So, bang! Right in the head. I’m really sorry, buddy” with a crooked smile he placed his hand on Brock’s shoulder to show some kind of sympathy.

Headshot was lucky that Samson had already counted from one to ten in his mind like Rusty had advised him to do in situations inappropriate for upcoming range. That had help – Brock merely glanced at the other man with deadly eyes, and the other hurried to put his hand away and returned on his previous spot. After that the bodyguard decided that had been enough of the OSI-time-spending for that day and left without further ado. 

Yes, Brock was brought down yet again, but he didn’t let himself to be sore. He didn’t want some stupid accidents and circumstances to ruin the week, to ruin the very event he had been waiting for. No, he would meet Doc with a face of a man who knew how to have good time on his own, but who is glad to have a core of the family back anyway. And what could be a better idea to cheer a professional killer up than to visit a freshly opened black-market weaponry store.

Of course, the OSI had its own warehouse of a hundred most advanced and sufficient guns, explosives and other equipment, but black-markets offered items from private hands or abroad, some of them existed only in a single copy. Therefore, spending time in a place like this for Brock was similar to wandering around in the most exciting museum ever, which, besides everything else, had its showpieces for sale too.

The way from the Tower to the store would take about an hour, as Brock had estimated in mind – quite enough time to sit back and enjoy some bad-ass music at full volume as he loved to do while riding alone. The bodyguard went through a pile of cassettes scattered across the car to find something suitable and spotted the old one with the “Highway to Hell” label on it.

"Fuckin’ classic" the man chuckled and put the tape in. The well-known guitar intro started, making Brock shake his head slightly in rhythm when pushing the gas pedal and turning the steering wheel. God, he loved this album.

_No stop signs, speed limit_

_Nobody's gonna slow me down_

_Like a wheel, gonna spin it_

_Nobody's gonna mess me around_

_And I'm giving it my all, but I'm not the guy you're taking home, ooh_

_I keep dancing on my own_

Screech of the breaks was probably heard throughout the whole street.

A driver at the back of Adrienne wasn’t ready at all for stuns like that, he hardly managed to turn the wheel all the way to the right, directing his car right into the stamp. "What the fuck, mate?!" the man screamed hoarsely and got out, overlooking the damage. The pop song playing loudly out of the red Dodge Charger got the man even more pissed off than he had already been.

He strode to the other car with a malicious grin on his face and asked, looking inside the cabin "Are you a fucking fag or..." Other words faded from the man’s tongue as soon as he saw the driver – with a pumping vein on his temple and capillaries in the budged eyes. He looked dreadful enough to make the homophobic guy pee himself right away. 

"I am... sorry" he squeaked with shaking voice and disappeared into the thin air.

After that little episode Brock angrily pushed the “eject” button and turned the car around – in the illegal place, of course, but he didn’t give a damn. Rock music was something sacred for the man, no wonder he went right through the lawns and sidewalks avoiding jam back to the Tower. He had a talk to make. A good old talk with the very person, who had borrowed his cassette for a retro party about two weeks ago. The man, who indeed was Sergeant Hatred, had come off with only fright and an eye- bruise.

"You’re lucky Doc returns tomorrow and I don’t wanna you to upset him" the bodyguard threw out at the shocked man on the floor and left the building as casually as he had entered it before.

***

Brock still was at the black-market store when his watches alarm went off – that day the man had only one important mission to do, and it was the exact time to move out to the university.

Dean and Jared had already been waiting for the bodyguard when he showed up, and it seemed they felt pretty much comfortable together. Even too much if you’d ask Brock. For a moment here he even thought that they were holding hands - apparently, it was just an illusion. Anyway, Dean’s roommate was somewhat bothering Brock – the bodyguard couldn’t get rid of the image of their meeting in dorms. Young Venture was too naïve and pure for kinky shit like that.

“So, Jared,” the bodyguard looked in the rearview mirror and watched young men buckling up, “how’s your… beaver-friend doin’?”

“Well, he brings luck to the team as always,” he answered over excitedly with a broad hand gesture. Reddened Dean on the man’s right side coughed nervously and whispered “Brock didn’t mean that… you know, the last time, when you and the Beaver’s head…”

Jared just flashed his eyes opened in recognition “Wow, really?.. I’ve already told you - I was covering myself up, that’s it”. 

“Yeah, whateva ya say man,” was the only reply before Brock hit the gas.

The first place where they stopped was José’s car service, and at the time Hank was practicing guitar in the garage instead of working. His new friend, a colleague and bass player was there too, bringing the rhythm to the improvisation. Brock parked nearby and, with the engine still running, honked to draw attention – both young men swiftly quitted their activities and got into the car, Hank on the back seat with his brother and Jared. Indeed, the Venture twins got along with each other again. And, if being honest, the bodyguard probably wouldn’t let Dean go to the party without Hank, the strength part of their tandem.

As soon as the doors closed shut, Brock burnt rubber till they got stuck in the traffic jam. So, the car reached the needed destination when it had been already dark. The gray cape cod home outside the town was the very place to hold the party, which had been organized to celebrate some rich brad’s birthday. Not as rich as Ventures were, of course, but probably enough reach to be an asshole type of a guy, typical university bullshit. Anyway, it would be a great experience for both boys as Brock thought. They needed to socialize more, especially with their peers and without “grown-ups” presence. 

The party, due to the evidence, was in full swing - loud tasteful music coming out of the opened windows, toilet paper on trees, drunk youngsters in the bushes...

“Do you really think it’s a good idea?..” Dean tagged at Jared’s sleeve, while Hank and his friend were getting out of the car.

“Come on, you gotta live while you’re young” Jared smiled and put his arm around the other man. “I can’t stand seeing you all tense and inside your head, Dean. You need to relax, may be go a little bit crazy”.

A threatening cough from the driver seat made Venture jump, and Jared shortly pulled his arm away meeting the cold gaze in the rearview mirror.

Dean chuckled nervously and unbuckled with shaking hands “Yeah, you’re probably right. I need to have some fun from time to time”.

And as the young man opened the door Brock stretched to the back seats. “Hey, Jared,” he called out and placed his firm hand on the other’s shoulder, stopping him from leaving the car and following his friend. “You know, if something happens to the boys…”

“Nothing will happen to them,” the man assured calmly and threw the bodyguard’s hand off. “You haven’t forgotten that I’m Brown Widow, right?”

“Listen,” Brock got even closer and his voice started to sound like a snake’s hiss, “I don’t care if you are Dean’s roommate, or a plushie-fucker, or a superhero. Believe me, you wouldn’t like to know what I’m capable of, so don’t even dare to try something funny”.

Jared’s inhaled deeply, expression on his face was nothing like angry, but rather offended and hurt. “I would never do anything against Dean’s will” he cut off and stared right into the bodyguard’s eyes provocatively.

That was bold. And Brock liked it. He could feel the stubborn sincerity in Jared’s words and gaze, and that was something to be respected for. But the legendary OSI agent wasn’t the one to trust people that easily, especially when his six-sense suggested there was something more about Jared hanging out with Dean constantly. 

Who knows where this collision would lead, if it wasn’t for them being interrupted by the harsh thrust and a loud crashing noise. “Oh, Jesus,” Jared murmured out of surprise and looked back together with Brock.

Behind them there was a shiny new sports car, inhabited with high-as-fuck teenagers, that were attempting to leave the yard. Brock’s eye twitched as the sports car backed up a little and then bumped into Adrienne one more time.

“Get out, and have fun,” the bodyguard demanded with gravelly voice, his hand clenching on the wheel.

Jared didn’t find it necessary to argue and opened the side door right at the time Brock’s car got hit once again. “You won’t kill those kids, right?..” he asked the other man hesitantly. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll just help them to clear their heads,” Brock responded imagining the red Jaguar on the bottom of the yard’s pool.

***

It was about midnight when the tired bodyguard was driving back home. It actually felt nice for the day to end – it seemed everything had been against the man for some reason, but the next day would be a better one. Probably, the best one in last week or so. That was the only reason to keep him going without killing everyone on the way, really.

The stomp lights and other cars headlights were flickering on the sides of Adrienne, as Brock was speeding down the highway, his hair flying in the wind of the opened window. Inside the cabin one could hear only roaring of the engine and air whistling, sounds that could tranquilize and lull. But Brock was always tense, always on standby, that’s why he didn’t even flinch at the beeping of his communicator.

“Oh, hey, Doc,” he let down his guard and smiled at the sight of a familiar face. The scientist faltered for a moment and then returned a smile, more awkward than sincere.

“Yeah, hi… How is it going?” he greeted habitually and scratched his thick beard.

“Ah, everything’s fine,” the bodyguard lied averting his eyes on the road. “Anyway, when do you arrive tomorrow? Should I, like… I don’t know. Buy something for you or prepare, whatever”.

Rusty sighed and chuckled nervously “Well, about that. Actually, I’m staying in Alaska”.

Brock could feel his heart go straight through his feet all of a sudden. He swallowed hard and asked with a tight voice “What the hell, Doc?”

“I don’t freaking know!.. Like it’s me who wants to stay in this freezing shithole,” the man yapped and then looked around to check that no strangers were eavesdropping. “Listen, Brock, I’ve finished my contract work, have even signed and handled all the papers. Officially, I have nothing more to do here, and still they won’t let me out”.

The bodyguard blood had already started to boil after the horrendous day and the latest news from the scientist were, apparently, the last straw. He sensed he was losing the remains of his self-control.

At the same time Rusty continued with the talking “Anyway, Brock, maybe you could contact the OSI authority to clear the situation? After all, it’s your organization that holds me in here for no reason”.

The bodyguard was breathing heavily, his chest going up and down rhythmically. “No,” he barked shortly at the confused scientist. 

“What do you mean?..” Rusty raised his brow with suspicion, probably, assuming that his man was in cahoots with the OSI in this. 

“I’m not speakin’ with nobody,” Brock growled. “I’m coming to Alaska and taking you home, that’s what I fuckin’ mean”.

For a few seconds there was dead silence between two men, both of them making intense eye-contact with each other. The staring was interrupted by a sudden buzz and shortly annoying melody.

“Sorry. Phone,” Brock mumbled and took the call.

Somehow that wasn’t a complete surprise for him to hear accustomed high-pitched bawl “I am the Mighty Monarch!..” 

“Wrong fucking time,” the bodyguard cut off sharply. “What do you want?”

The villain instantly lost his courage and mumbled timidly “Well… I just wanna know if you could tell me what time Dr. Venture returns tomorrow? Maybe?”

“No, I fucking can’t,” the blond man roared into the phone. “You know why? Because he won’t fucking return! He is a fucking hostage in a fucking secret base, and I need to fucking go to fucking Alaska to fucking rescue him!”

With that being said Brock simply tossed his phone out from the window.

“Well, that was a little too much,” Rusty muttered with concern. “Had a rough day, huh?”


	6. Stuck in Alaska

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rusty's life in Alaska, Brock's arrival

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, people, for waiting and for reading :3  
> Please, leave kudos and comments if you like to see the end of the fic, they are really helping me to write more! Thanks! ^_^  
> BTW additional characters in the chapter are mostly insignificant to the main plot and are definitly temporary, so... don't worry about them.

If the first day in Alaska had been merely tedious, then the second one showed Rusty all the colors of being exhausted – physically, intellectually and mentally. On Tuesday the wake-up alarm went off at four am, making the scientist jump up on the bed in shock – no one had warned him they would have to get up this early. Even bigger surprise was waiting for him later in the face of physical exercises, which were done outside, on the fenced ground freshly cleared from the snow.

At the begging Rusty felt rather uncomfortable in his thin sports uniform and had to dance on the same place to get warmer, white steam coming out of his mouth as he was grumbling. The man looked around and, obviously, couldn’t find any familiar faces – all three of his teammates had health issues, so they had been exempt from above-average physical activity. Dr. Venture, on the other hand, had been found cleared for trainings, which didn’t seem exactly fair in his opinion.

Anyway, after the tenth circle of jogging the man was actually glad he had such a light tracksuit – his body temperature had shortly increased and cold sweat had started running down his spine. On the fifteenth circle Rusty fell behind and managed to leave the line of runners just to lean on the stamp and call Brock for moral support. Namely, complaining. Their conversation didn’t last long though – apparently, the bodyguard wanted to have a break from Rusty’s phiz, or maybe he just had been in a bad mood, so he had let the call to its end about a minute after.

The scientist was still looking at the dark screen of his communicator when the man in charge saw him procrastinating and shouted imperiously “Hey, you, beanpole! We don’t fool around in here, got it? Now drop and give me a fifty!”

After laborious thirteen push-ups Dr. Venture fell flat on the algid pavement, sensing the remains of his dignity fruitlessly trying to revolt.

"What, that's it?" the lieutenant smirked and spitted down. "Pathetic! But we'll work on it, buddy".

Hearing the given promise, Rusty swallowed - he sure did learn his lesson and understood why the other scientists were so quiet and repressed.

Surprisingly, morning exercises didn’t end with running, squatting, pushing up and pulling up. After the trainees finished those physical activities, the low rank soldiers arranged target bords across one side of the fence and prepared assault rifles to be given out. Rusty had a feeling he was a noobie in a military college, and not an honorable scientist working on a secret project.

In any case, although Dr. Ventures muscles were sore after previous exertion and fingers were numb due to the freeze, when it was his turn to pull the trigger he didn’t disappoint - as an ex-boy adventurer he had gained somewhat experience of handling guns, and missed only few times. Being relatively okay at the shooting range helped Rusty to merit a lenient nod from an officer, but some of the other scientists weren’t that lucky. And those, who weren’t lucky enough, ended up being mocked and offended in front of everyone else at the training ground. 

About half-an-hour later the morning workout had finished. People were driven together in public showers and then, in a short time, sent to the dining room. Dr. Venture simply followed the crowd as a brainless zombie to find himself in the spacious chamber, furnished with blank tables and benches. It didn’t take the man long to spot his trio in the line for the breakfast, so he came over and joined them shamelessly. Standing there, among his employees, Rusty couldn’t stop complaining and resenting the weird rules of the place.

"I understand the contract’s part of compliance with the local charter, but why in the hell do scientists need to get trained like soldiers?"

The tallest guy of the group, Nick, who stood ahead of Rusty, only shrugged apathetically "I don’t know, man, they just do it. And I kind of don’t care unless I’m involved".

Rusty smirked with a witty remark in return "Oh, you should care. Because if your boss gets upset, eventually, you'll get upset too". The limping man frowned and raised his eyes to the ceiling for a moment, thinking over what had been said.

"It's military forces, sir," Archie, the overweight youngster, suggested. "This people don’t know any better. And they are probably bored to death, so… the commandeers had to make up something to occupy lower rank soldiers with".

"Yeah, it’s easy to defend them, when you stay in your warm bed, while _other_ people are being pushed around in the freezing cold" Rusty grumbled and shoved his tray further on the slide as the queue was slowly moving on.

It was a disaster. If Dr. Venture had known that military had been involved, he wouldn’t agree to take the job in the first place. But, after all, he _had_ agreed and he would have to tolerate poor treatment unless… unless he would cancel the contract. Rusty frowned at the thought - as much as he wanted to give up everything and return home, he still didn’t want to look like a wimp or a looser once again. Getting mocked by his family and friends wasn’t a part of the man’s plan. And, after all, his initial plan was to change things up. To became a better version of Rusty Venture. To show everyone else what he really was capable of. The man sighed – he himself wasn’t exactly sure about the last statement.

The scientist didn’t have enough time to chew over the topic, as it was his turn at the counter. An attendant scanned barcode on Rusty’s uniform above the name tag and started filling the tray.

"Eww," Dr. Venture cringed at the appearance of gelatinous substance that supposed to be porridge and a glass of green swill. "Can I have some of those instead?" he pointed on the display, where there was a variety of much more appetizing-looking food.

"Nah," the staff woman answered without elaboration.

"Come on, why has the OSI guy before us got normal human food?" Rusty remonstrated, placing a hand on his hip.

"If you don’t like it, you can have a fasting day, how ‘bout that?" the woman suggested in a hostile tone.

But sometimes all you had to do to get what you want was acting bold – and Rusty knew it for sure. So, he willingly embraced the opportunity to try this approach out.

"Oh, I got it. You probably don’t know who I am," he grinned at the attendant. "Not only I’m the leader of a team working on the highly important OSI project, but also Rust Venture, the head of the famous VenTech company".

The woman looked confused for a moment like she was making a decision within her mind. And, finally, she chuckled with a throaty voice "Yeah, right. Like I care. Now move on, stop holding up the line". Indeed, people behind Rusty had already began to mumble complains making the man grab his tray and simply stride away.

He couldn’t believe scientists were treated like that in the place, obviously, considered to be below the OSI agents and soldiers.

"Are we the lowest cast here or what?" Doc asked and sat around the table with Nick and Kimberly, while Archie was still getting served.

The elderly woman budged her cow-like eyes out at Rusty and sniffed. "Oh, no, dear," she answered lisping like she was talking with her grandchild. "There are also technicians and staff. They are _really_ getting it hard. And our lovely Maggie here at the counter - she's an exception".

At that time the team’s youngest member had almost walked over to the table, but was intercepted by a group of OSI agents that had decided to cross the room in front of him. Archie abruptly stopped in front of the passing space, his abdomen sticking out on the way slightly. The man wanted to back up a step to free more space, but for his distress, couldn’t do it, as people behind him had already created another queue. So, instead, Archie tried to suck his stomach in and freeze like that. That move seemed to flow nice, until the very last agent came around and deliberately pushed the pudge knocking over his tray. "Oops," the OSI man said mockingly and continued his way.

Rusty was hardly holding back the want to yelp at the insolent agent, but he knew that he better not. He didn’t have authority, he didn’t have Brock at his side, and his physical state left much to be desired.

"What the hell," he whispered angrily after the group of OSI agents moved away far enough and Archie with the leavings of his breakfast joined the team at the table. "It feels like we are fresh meat in a jail".

"Ah, that’s not so bad if you don’t show off and act reasonable" Nick commented taking a gulp from the glass, his hands slightly shaking. "Can get used to it anyway".

"I don’t want to get used to be treated like garbage, thank you" Rusty exclaimed and threw his spoon in the bowl, watching the cutlery sticking in and standing perfectly still in the mash. "This was a huge mistake".

The man folded his arms and stared into the void without blinking, overflowed with contradictional emotions. The scales were starting to tip in favor of the option to leave Alaska once and for all.

Rusty’s team members, apparently, felt the swing of his mood and started fidgeting on the bench, exchanging meaningful looks in silence.

"You aren’t actually considering quitting, right?" the tallest man finally asked, a sudden worry was heard in his voice and his right eye twitched.

"Of course, I do!.. And, in fact, I am shocked that all of you are still here," Rusty confirmed and scooped a spoon full of the porridge with hammy disgust.

"Money speaks louder than insults, man,” Nick grinned in all fairness and then his expression returned to an indifferent again. “We, contrary to you, don’t have a hereditary income-producing company".

At the mention of VenTech Doc instantly frowned and averted his gaze. In reality things weren’t going as smoothly as people assumed them to, and that had been Rusty’s fault. Well, at some extend at least. But it wasn’t the right time to dwell on the subject.

"I don’t understand," Rusty continued after shaking off unpleasant thoughts. "Why do you even care? You've just met me".

"We can’t work together without a strong leading hand," Archie intervened, not at all sad after the recent accident. "You may think that we are getting along just fine, but in the lab there are always arguing, fighting and shouting, especially after our previous leader was gone".

"And also, there are responsibilities we don’t wanna take" Nick agreed with a nod.

Honest motives explanation of the team members didn’t land very well. Those people weren’t model workers at all, as it seemed, and Rusty could almost feel all the pain he would have to go through to make them function together productively. He overlooked the nerds sitting beside him and weighted his chances once again – with the right approach he, most probably, could make them obedient and respectful, it was a matter of psychology. Moreover, bossing around could be a nice change after all. So why not waiting one more day to decide if he really wanted to quit?..

The rest of the Tuesday had passed by surprisingly quickly and Rusty hadn’t even noticed how he ended up falling on his bed, burnt-out. The OSI did everything to make people work or at least pretend to be working – scientists were allowed to leave the lab only to use a restroom, which was guaranteed by a pair of agents standing outside the laboratory doors; and a team leader had to make a daily report, but most importantly there was no wi-fi or internet connection whatsoever for the contract employees.

The man turned over to the other side, his head resting on the Brock's folded coat atop a stone-like pillow. Rusty inhaled deeply, savoring the familiar scent of masculinity, the deceptive feeling of peace and security raising up in him. The scientist couldn’t even be angry with the bodyguard’s morning outburst – after all, Brock was right, it had been Rusty’s idea all along, and he got to stick to it like a _real_ man would. He needed to get himself together. _To deal with shit in his head_. To make his brain work. Maybe he didn’t have an actual degree, but he was a Venture, god damn it.

***

Next morning Rusty woke up inwardly bracing himself for the upcoming misery, but that day, on the contrary, would bring different dynamic into his life.

Everything began, as the last time, with running in circles. Only with a difference of Dr. Venture being bullied not by a soldier but by another scientist, who artfully tripped Rusty making the latter tumble down on the asphalt. Somehow, the man managed to land on his hands and not his face, although thin gloves didn’t do much to ease the fall.

"You okay there?" the disembodied voice from behind asked and a person it belonged made a move to help Rusty stand up.

"Yeah, I’m fine," the scientist mumbled and fixed the glasses. His palms and knees were annoyingly burning after the engagement with the ground, but that didn’t bother him as much as being a laughing-stock to some asshole. Interestingly enough, that asshole was a team leader involved in the Extraterrestrial Supersonic Fuel project, which was directly related to the Doc’s one. 

After finishing boring into the runners, Rusty turned to the soldier towering over him. He was probably in his late thirtieth, well-build, with an average face and prominent ears.

"Thanks. Didn’t know there were also good guys among..." Dr. Venture glanced on the man’s shoulder boards and swallowed the rest of the words.

The major only chuckled and kept looking the quite scientist up and down. "So," his eyes slid over the tag on the scientist’s uniform. "Rusty. Who did this?"

"Em... that has probably been just an accident," the shorter man lied, not risking a chance of being considered to be a rat.

“As naïve as a baby,” the major shook his head with a barely seen smile, totally buying Doc’s bullshit. And then the officer suddenly straightened up and his face tightened.

"Stand down, people!" he commanded to the running scientists, cold determination in his voice and eyes. “Ryan Cox, out!” the man barked after his order had been obeyed, while Rusty was still standing behind totally confused.

Next thing Dr. Venture knew – his bully had been easily provoked to hit Connor Price, the major, who effortlessly dodged the punch, making Ryan meet the ground with his face, which was rather dignity insulting. And then, for the following five minutes or so, the unfortunate scientist had to do push-up with a heavy military boot pressing on his back.

That episode was weird. And, surprisingly, taking revenge on the offender wasn’t the end of major’s interest in Rusty. Later that day Connor offered the scientist to join his table during the breakfast. That was a bolt out of the blue not only for Dr. Venture and his teammates, but, apparently, for the majority of other people, expect from the old-timers. And from that moment on Rusty had officially became the one in favor of the executive-officer.

Yes, at first Connor’s attention was a bit uncomfortable - the scientist expected a catch to this, but, eventually, he learned how to milk the cow. Being on friendly terms with the authority, aka being able to manipulate the major, had considerably improved not only Rusty’s living conditions at the base, but also his employees’. They practically were guaranteed the inviolability even among the OSI – although it was a separate unit, that didn’t obey the military, it had to keep the peace. And the peace had already been shaken even prior to Rusty’s arrival. 

***

It was an ordinary Sunday evening in the scientists’ quarters. Except for the fact that officially it was the last working day for Venture’s team in Alaska – the project had been completed and handed over, all documents had been signed and promised money had been transferred.

People’s departure was scheduled the next day at six am, and to get to the airport one, first of all, needed the permission to cross the base’s border. For some reason, Rusty hadn’t been approved to get into the list, contrary to the other team members, and would have to stay. At the time there was nothing else he could do about this – he had already made a fuss in the HR office, had tortured the project manager with his nagging and had even been escorted out from the OSI commander’s compartment. All Rusty had left was to wait for the situation to clear up with time. And that time needed to be killed.

“…the horrendous beast sees an easy prey in the face of Thadonir, the great wizard. So, quick, what would you do?” Archie turned to his ex-leader with an expectant look.

“Aaaah,” it took only few seconds for Rusty to decide. “I’ll try to talk the beast down”.

The Dungeon Master googled his eyes “What?.. Really?”

“Sure! The thing is unaffected by magic and I have, like, plenty of charisma points,” the man smirked and rolled the dices one after another, watching them forming a successful combination. He had already gaped to make a smug remark, but was interrupted by the flowing mechanical noise of the door sliding open. 

The wizard shut his mouth closed and everyone turned their heads to the entrance. And then Rusty’s heart skipped a beat.

At the doorsteps there was Brock standing, his face still blushing after being out in the cold. The man’s gaze was radiating tension, but as his eyes spotted the familiar face, he relaxed a bit – quite frankly the bodyguard had imagined Dr. Venture being an actual hostage, but there he was, playing a board game. 

“Oh,” Kimberly batted her eyes at the appeared man. “Is it your boyfriend, dear? He’s so handsome!”

Rusty nearly jumped hearing the assumption. “What?.. No, I don’t have a boyfriend” he almost screamed and bit his lip – at the time the possibility of Brock getting pissed at him was the last thing Doc wanted.

“Yeah, Kim, it was stupid to say that,” Nick confirmed and leaned back on the floor with his elbows. “Because they are definitely husbands”.

“Rust and ruin,” the red-haired man cursed slapping himself in the face and then tilted head to his bodyguard who was standing still with a poker face. “That what I was talking about, Brock!.. They are insufferable”.

After that being said, Dr. Venture stood up from the floor and dusted his pants. “So, have you spoken to Gathers yet?” he asked quietly after coming close to the blond man.

“Nah, I told ya I wouldn’t,” the agent threw out and unzipped his coat. “Sides, he wouldn’t be involved in this”.

“Are you sure?” Rusty crossed the arms to seem more distant, so that his excitement wouldn’t be so obvious. “Because he is actually here, in Alaska”.

Brock sighed and took his hat off, visibly irritated. He had really hoped that he would simply throw Doc over his shoulder and, having the level of access high enough, would walk out of the base like nothing happened. But things had turned out to be more complicated after all. “All right, let’s go and see him then,” the agent grumbled. 

*** 

"Well, I be damned" the general barked and overtly handled ten dollars to Shore Leave who was leaning on the corner of the table. “What brings you here, Samson?”

“I wanted to ask you the same question,” Brock blurted out narrowing his eyes at Gathers.

The man was sitting around the table with his legs on top of it and didn’t show any sign of anxiety, but all the same he was unprecedentedly good at bluffing.

Hunter only scoffed at the agent’s reply. “Huh, he’s got some balls, and that’s why I like him!” he confessed to Shore Leave and stood up, his arms folded at the back. 

“The secret base in Alaska, code name Northern Hell, has been recognized as no longer suitable for the OSI needs,” the general stated and came closer to Brock, which instantly straightened himself up in respect for the commander. Rusty, at the same time, was standing few centimeters away from his bodyguard’s back with the “im-sick-of-this-shit” expression written all over his face.

“Therefore, I’m here to sign documents on the transfer of assets to the Army of The United States tomorrow,” Gathers finished in his official tone. “So, what about you, kid?”

“Hmm, I’m giving Dr. Venture a ride home,” Brock answered. Shore Leave coughed dramatically.

It appeared, that the general had already forgotten about his guests. He headed back to the table and started looking through a pile of papers, the man seemed not to care about what had been said at all.

“Sooo,” Rusty drawled hesitantly. “Can we go back to New York now?”

“What?..” Hunter raised his head up from the documents. “No. There’s still one more task for you to do, Dr. Venture”.

The scientist moved forward and spread his arms in shock, he had no idea what the general was referring to. “What task?” he yelped annoyingly. “I’ve fulfilled my contract in full”.

“Here,” Gathers took the file at his right side and offered it to Rusty, but Brock was the first to grab the thing. “Last page, second paragraph”.

The blond man was going through the text briefly, holding the papers close to his face, and Rusty had to stand on his tip-toes to read as well. Finally, the scientist found the exact place the general had been talking about and rejoined “Wait a minute, this wasn’t here before!”

“Well, you’ve probably missed it at the first reading. Happens all the time,” Gathers answered and chewed on his mouthpiece. “So, yeah, Dr. Venture, your last task is to test the ESF in the Spheric laboratorium. And after that you are totally free”.

Yet again, Rusty felt that something was off with this final job he’d been assigned to. It didn’t make sense. Of course, his project was closely related to the ESF, but still it was a separate thing - if someone was needed to run tests on the sample, it should have been Ryan. 

“Wait, wait, wait,” Dr. Venture protested. “Why don’t you put the ESF team on this one? And have they not tested the fuel in the base’s labs already?”

“Too many questions,” Hunter cut off slamming his palms flat on the table top. “Departure tomorrow at six am, the attendant team will be waiting for you at the north gates with the required equipment,” he barked roughly showing that any further inquiry wouldn’t be tolerated. 

“And Samson,” the general continued with a much more peaceful tone, “you don’t have to go with Dr. Venture on that boring one. He’ll be escorted by our field agents”.

“Ah, don’t have better things to do anyways, so…” Brock shrugged and the OSI commander grunted at the answer with a short nod.

“Well, then you should go,” he suggested returning back to the documents.

And as the OSI legend and his ward left the room, Shore Leave leaned over Gathers, stuck-up smile drawn on his face “I guess, you own me another ten bucks”. 

*** 

After the situation had become clear, Brock finally could breathe easier. His goal was to bring Doc back home from Alaska, and at the time the bodyguard knew how to accomplish it. There actually was nothing else to worry about that day, all Brock could do – wait until the morning.

Of course, Shore Leave’s presence at the base and his bet with Gathers were rather suspicious, as well as Rusty’s statement about contract being changed pointed to questionable reasons of his last task, but… But all of that was another thing, and that thing could be dealt with later, after the scientist would be back in New York.

“… has been already approved to be implemented in real life,” Brock heard the scientist ranting and shook his head returning into reality from his own thoughts. He looked at the man besides him - actually, it was the first time that day when the agent could leisurely examine Rusty and fully comprehend that they were existing at the same time in the same place.

The most striking change in the scientist, with no doubt, was his carefully trimmed beard with mustache, and for other people it, probably, would be the only one. But Brock could actually see Rusty’s posture being straighter and a little more confident - he wondered if the Alaska’s trip had, after all, done good for Doc. 

“So, are you going to the OSI quarters?” Dr. Venture asked and looked at the taller man.

It felt strange. Thorough all these years, Brock had never paid attention to the scientist’s eyes, but now, for some reason, he truly saw them and was captivated by them – dark blue, of the night’s sky shade.

“You could hang out with us if you want,” Rusty suggested with a nervous chuckle. To be honest, he didn’t expect his bodyguard to take the offer, but the blond man did, although on his terms.

Brock wasn’t a geek at all and didn’t have any intention to became one in his early fortieth, no surprise D&D session was ruled out of possible options to kill the time. So, the bodyguard decided to find something better to do in the scientists’ company - he left Dr. Venture chatting with his ex-team members and headed to the agents’ level of the base.

In no time the man returned back with a deck of cards and three bottles of tequila. The game had begun.

It was a Frankenstein mixture of poker and truth-or-dare, with some of people only playing for points, and the others – also on taking shots. The only abstainers were Rusty and Archie, while Nick drank a lot, because he lost a lot. And the man clearly couldn’t hold his liqueurs properly. Brock and Kimberly, on the other hand, were among winners mostly and didn’t have to consume alcohol every other round. Obviously, that hadn’t been acceptable for Brock, so he had left one bottle personally for himself and was occasionally gulping from it during the game.

“Argh, I have a pair,” Dr. Venture showed his hand with discontent and took away points from his account in the notebook.

“Excellent,” Nick grinned and rubbed his hands against each other. “Noooow! Choose wisely, dude – do ya want truth or do ya want dare?” The man was raising his brows up and down, making Rusty cringe a bit at the sight.

“I guess, truth would be more sensible,” the ex-team leader decided and put the notebook away, waiting for the question.

“So,” Nick giggled, covering his mouth with a hand. “Waaaait for it, wait, still not,” he was playing for time while looking at the other people in the room alternatively, his eye moving jerkily. “Okay, all right… So! Dear Dr. Venture, we all are incre…cre-di-bly intri-igu-gued to know if you, like, ever-ever, at least oooonce accidentally had it with a guy. I mean… in any sexual way, that is”.

Everyone went silent and stared at the man, but Rusty didn’t even bothered to be angry. He folded his arms in a protective way and answered in a cold, dry voice “No, of course I didn’t”.

“Hey, ain’t we supposed to play fair and square, Doc?” the bodyguard blurted out, and the scientist almost felt his insides contract.

“Come on, Brock what are you talking about?” he shrugged with a laugh, trying to show how ridiculous the assumption was.

The blond man leaned closer and pointed his finger at the scientist’s chest. “Oh, you know what I’m talking about,” he said quietly in a low voice.

“I don’t know what Pete has told you about,” Rusty started whispering back to Brock, like nobody else was actually watching and hearing them, “but tossing off with your friend in the same room doesn’t count as being gay”. 

“Jesus, I didn’t mean that,” Brock frowned at the man, not sure if he needed to know this information. “Just admit that you had, Doc, and we won’t be touching this subject again”.

“Nah-ha, cowboy,” Rusty shook the head and made himself comfortable, while the other players were quietly enjoying the show. “You can’t ask for that, because you don’t have any evidence. And there is no evidence”.

“Oh, really?” Brock smirked and licked his lips. “How ‘bout the huge ass dildo under your bed?”

“Phhh,” the scientist only threw his hand in the air, showing that there was a total luck of reasoning in the bodyguard’s point. “Many straight men and women enjoy anal pleasure, _Brock_. And thanks for reveling my personal preferences to everyone, by the way”.

The both men were staring at each other challengingly. Rusty honestly believed that the OSI agent didn’t have anything on him and was only trying to annoy the scientist for some reason. But Dr. Venture – oh, no, he would never let it slip, at least because he didn’t need Brock to think less of him. And for Brock it had become a matter of a principle at some point. Maybe it was tequila speaking, or maybe he still hadn’t got over the hard day, he didn’t know. All he knew was the fact that he wanted to bring the dirty little secret up.

And that what he did. He leaned back with a deep inhale and closed his eyes, inwardly returning to his college years, ready to reveal another part of his life.

***

Capitan Shark.

That’s how the joint was called. The name as cheap as the place itself.

Brock didn’t know what he was doing here - one of his fellow players had recommended this unfrequented bar for an extra pleasurable time passing, but all the young man could see around were junkies, wretched drinks and prostitutes. It was kind of a depressing place, but so was Brock’s mood at the moment.

Of course, his first days in college hadn’t been so bad - he had been accepted in the football team right away and girls had been crazy about him with his broad shoulders, tight ass and long blond hair. But then there also was studying. Studying, that Brock didn’t care about and considered to be the most boring thing ever – he was doubting the whole decision of wasting his precious time on that. Perhaps, his destination was something else, but he hadn’t found it yet.

As the man sat on a tall stool in front of a bartender and asked for a boilermaker, a curvy brunette slid on the free place besides Brock. He merely looked at the woman and downed his whiskey in one gulp, chasing it by the beer.

The girl didn’t call it a day and leaned closer to the football player, starting to chitchat with him, although the man didn’t pay much attention. Actually, his eyes were fixed on the boney guy, that was chilling on the shabby coach at the left side of the bar. He was laughing hysterically, passing his blunt into the other hophead’s hands.

And for some reason, that man was annoying the hell out of Brock - his bright red hair, pointy nose, his flashy trousers with stripes and laughter over the top.

"Who’s that guy?" he asked the girl next to him, interrupting her story.

She looked around for a second and then turned to Brock again, placing a lock of hair behind her ear.

"Oh, that ginger junkie? He comes here from time to time, smoking weed with guys, blowing them after" she giggled and touched the football player’s shoulder suggestively. "Don’t know the details, but I’ve heard his name's Rust".

Brock hemmed, still drilling his eyes into the redhead man - there was something about him that didn’t let the blond look away. "So, ya’re telling he's a whore?"

"Well," the girl grinned and stroked Brock’s upper arm. "If you consider weed being a currency, then yes. But why are you so interested anyway, handsome?"

At the very same time as the chick asked her question, Rust and the other guy were moving towards the toilets, still followed by the Brock’s stare. And then something odd happened.

The ginger junkie turned his head and, noticing the intense gaze from the other man, winked at him with a little wicked smile, sending sudden quivers running all over Brock.

"Don’t know," the blond man mumbled with aggravation, "his face just asks to be punched".

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If there are any mistakes - write me privately, please.  
> Leave a kudo or a comment if you like the thing ;3  
> Share your ideas too, I'd love that


	7. Let's talk this one out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning: some blood and minor character deaths (it's Venture Bros, duh)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for waiting! \\(★ω★)/  
> Yes, sometimes it takes me a lot of time to get in the mood, oops!
> 
> Overall, it's not too far from the end of the story. Although, it could take a while.  
> But kudos and comments always help, I swear (^ω~)

Brock looked at the other agent with seeable disaffection as the latter was sitting down at the same table. "What are ya doin’ here?" the blond man asked in a gravelly voice.

Shore Leave placed a tray on the top and leaned on his arm, sighing. He was a drama queen, as always, raising eyes to the ceiling, showing exaggerated annoyance "I'm so fucking bored! All the cool kids are on a mission, when I’m stuck with Sniffy - no, thanks". The man popped his knuckles and look around the room with a grin "’Sides, there is plenty of fresh fish that waits to be caught".

Shore’s brow suddenly went up, as he noticed something intriguing on the other side of the room. "Hey," he bent over, getting closer to the other agent like he was about to share a juicy secret, and Brock repeated the movement. "Isn’t it Dr. Venture over there, with the military guys? I thought, he kind of hates them".

"He does," Samson agreed blankly, staring at the pointed direction. "Gotta check on the situation," he stated and stood up from his place. He had been already aggravated. And mostly aggravated by himself.

Ever since the previous evening Brock had felt importunate tension building up inside of him. He didn’t like the way he had spilled the beans so easily - without any thought almost, just to see Doc’s reaction. That simply meant his emotions were winning over, while he had genially believed to have conquered those inner demons. But, and that was a big but, after Brock had met his scientist in real flesh, things had changed. There was no more room for doubting and denying – Rusty was the one to make blood rush into the agent’s head (actually, not only head), which was troublesome in many ways. Brock had let emotions rule the ball and had been regretting it all along, however… 

However, that very moment was déjà vu all over again. Something uncontrollable was burning inside Brock’s chest as he was approaching the major’s table. At first, the bodyguard thought his ward was probably in trouble and needed help, which, of course, made him become rather angry, but soon enough the man figured out that Dr. Venture was, actually, fine and, even more – that the major was looking at him particularly friendly, even affectionately. And that made Brock way angrier, to the point of boiling.

Rusty was picking at his food with a long face and the major was eagerly telling him about past glories again, when Samson approached from behind and ostentatiously placed his hand on the scientist’s shoulder, making the latter jump out of surprise.

"Hey, Rust, why don’t ya join us?" the bodyguard rather insisted then suggested and the shorter man only blinked in confusion as a reply.

"He's sitting here," the major interrupted, his jaw tightly clenched.

Almost instantly, Dr. Venture felt the high voltage between two men. He could sense the trouble coming. So, as Rusty had decided, it was time to step in and to try to calm them down. "I should, probably, make an introduction, gentlemen," he droned grudgingly, still pouting at Brock after the game. "That is Connor Price, the major. He's basically an executive here," the scientist paused for a second. "And that’s my bo..."

"Brock Samson," the blond man cut in, his voice even and challenging. He knew he didn’t need to say more - his reputation spoke for himself. Indeed, the major stood up and stretched out his arm "I've heard a lot about you, agent". Brock willingly returned the gesture, and men’s hands collapsed together, one trying to intimidate the other by the strong grip.

"Anyway,” Brock pressed even harder, his lips curving into a smirk, “I’m taking Doc to the OSI table". The major didn’t flinch. He was a strong guy, no doubt.

"Hell you are," Connor sneered back and by that time, it seemed, everyone in the room was silently observing the scene between the agent and the officer, the OSI and the military. It seemed people were ready to jump at each other’s throats at any time.

"He clearly wants to stay here," the major declared squinting his eyes.

Rusty was sitting on his chair (yes, the elite didn’t have to use benches), pressing a palm to the face, feeling side stares from all over the place. That was ridiculous - whenever Brock encountered another alpha male, he somehow desperately needed to prove himself superior, and this time had decided to choose the weirdest reasoning ever. Surly, the bodyguard didn’t want to sit with Dr. Venture _that_ bad, as the scientist thought. Moreover, the blond man didn’t even bother to apologize for his big mouth, which made Rusty slightly more irritated and prevented him from taking Brock’s side in the fight. And, finally, the way both opponents were deciding things for Rusty without his involvement, had drew the man out of himself, so at some point he harshly leaped up from his place.

"I’m not a fucking thing!" he yelled, slamming his fists on the table.

The scientist’s flare-up instantly put Brock and Connor into the state of shock, making them both forget about their belligerency. They turned heads to the man and froze, waiting for the unfolding events. Rusty exhaled a sigh, trying to calm down, and proceeded with the scolding.

"I can decide for myself what I want," he announced accusingly and grabbed his tray. "And I don’t want to sit with nether of you, so you can stop your… sandbox- squabble".

With that being said the shorter man moved out to the scientists’ compartment, earning a bit of applause from colleagues and making the conflict die out. The major silently got down on his chair, staring at the floor, and Brock retreated to Shore Leave with a sullen face.

"What a show," the mustachioed agent chuckled, earning an advice to shut up.

***

White vapor exited the man’s mouth as he emitted a deep breath – finally, Dr. Venture was outside, away from the people and their curious stares, and that felt a bit better. Although, Rusty usually didn’t dislike increased attention, he wasn’t in the right mood for boasting that day, all he wanted was to finish the useless job and return home, where there was much to be done.

The scientist crossed his arms in discomfort, looking at all the snow surrounding the ground, and headed to the small group of people near the gates, who supposed to be his escort. They all were wearing signature OSI blue-and-gold protection suits, just like Rusty was.

Big puffy snowflake flew right into the man's eye, and he instantly cursed, putting down the helmet's shield and continuing walking. As the distance between him and the group was slowly shortening, he could clearly see that there were three field agents preparing for the take off and another scientist. Rusty figured out who this second scientist was right away and rolled his eyes. Ryan. Of-fucking-course.

"What in the hell are you doing here?" Dr. Venture asked after approaching the man, not even hiding hostility in his voice.

"No, what are _you_ doing here?" the taller man started poking Rusty’s chest with an index. "That’s my project, buddy, and, somehow, you are in charge of it now".

Doc slapped the other man’s arm affrontedly, trying to make him stop. "Quit doing that," he insisted with annoyance. "And I am not your buddy".

"Well, well, well, look at you!.. Now you are Miss Touch-Me-Not all of a sudden," Cox cackled quietly and then proceeded taunting "So, what's the tea? Who else did you lay under to piss me off?"

Rusty could only sneer to himself under the helmet, fully unaware how such a ludicrous idea had been born in his colleague’s mind. "Oh, please!” the man theatrically threw the hand in the air. “Contrary to you, I have enough competence to be promoted for my brains".

The subject, apparently, was kind of sore for Dr. Cox himself, so the younger scientist didn’t hesitate to make a leap forward and grab the other one by his hood, pushing the man closer. Badly hidden anger was distorting his face, as the attacker opened Rusty’s shield up and whispered through the clenched teeth "You don’t know shit about me".

Dr. Venture had never been a muscle-fighting type, but rather a nag-you-to-death one. But, may be, it was the right time to change his tactic – after all, if the other man would decide to punch Rusty… well, Rusty could easily fight back, as the both scientists were clearly in the same lightweight league. The man had almost made up his mind about starting to fight back, when Ryan suddenly released the grip, throwing the arms down freely. Dr. Venture turned his head back and, to no surprise, saw the bodyguard standing right behind, threatening grin shining on the man’s face.

"Any problem, Doc?" he asked Rusty, staring at the other scientist unblinkingly.

"We're fine," Dr. Venture shrugged and toggled his friend by a sleeve, making him break eye contact with Cox and follow Rusty’s lead to their snowmobile.

"What's wrong with him?" Brock finally asked while taking his place at the driver’s sit.

"Ah, he's just jealous," Rusty smirked and adjusted his helmet’s shield. "Imagine that! He thinks I fucked my way up to... No, I just can’t!" He giggled, forgetting for a moment that he was in a pet, and slapped Brock on the shoulder, trying to hold his laughter. And as the laughter faded out, the scientist got in the back clumsy, not expecting the bodyguard to ask "So… you didn’t?"

"What?.. Brock, really?” Dr. Venture chuckled at the question. “Who would I sleep with, HR-manager?" There wasn’t any woman at high position in the base, and the bodyguard had probably known it, so his doubting seemed quite unreasonable at first. And then something clicked in Rusty’s head.

"Wait..." he pulled up his shield with a frown, "you didn’t mean women, did you?"

But by the time Rusty finished this sentence, the driver had already hit the gas, making no room for further conversation.

***

The way to the laboratorium laid through the miles-and-miles of snow – you could see nothing beneath its layers, and that’s why it was so dangerous. For that reason, one of the agents on a high-speed skimobile was driving ahead of the rest, making fresh trails. Brock and Rusty were following him about ten meters apart, the next was Cox with his escort, and the closing was another OSI agent on the one-seat vehicle. 

The group had reached its destination about two nonstop-driving hours later, and this time had passed surprisingly unnoticeable for Brock. The ride was an enjoyable change of pace in comparison with wasting life idling in The Big Apple. But, honestly saying, it was just a pleasant bonus, while the real deal was to sense Dr. Venture’s tight and warm grip on his torso – finally, Brock could be sure in the man’s safety, and that’s what mattered the most. 

Rusty, on the other hand, couldn’t share his friend’s enthusiasm – at the end of the ride he felt pretty sick and, as the vehicles were parked near the building, was eager to leave his seat right away.

As Dr. Venture was getting it together with Ryan shooting derisive looks at him, one of the agents entered the password in order to unlock the doors, and the group slowly moved on. Inside they were greeted by a deem-lighted room with a huge old piece of machinery in it.

“So,” Rusty put his hands on the hips inspecting thousands of buttons and levers on the panel. “Gathers said something about equipment for this one”.

“Ah, right,” the nameless OSI agent opened up his bag and got two thick volumes out. “Here you go,” he said and threw one instruction book into Venture’s hands and the other into Ryan’s.

“What, that’s it?..” Rusty’s shoulders went down as he was flipping through the pages of fine print.

“Well,” the agent answered scratching his head “there are also some samples”.

“No fucking way,” was the only reply from Dr. Cox and, actually, Rusty was on board with him on that one.

So, the work had begun. Well, it didn’t exactly look like work, but people were doing what they could – the scientists were examining their manuals, trying to figure out how the machinery operated, and the agents were trying to kill time and not die out of boredom. The whole hour had passed, and there was still nothing - the instructions were awfully written for some reason. They were too vague and overcomplicated, and neither Rusty nor Ryan could sort out what to do. After heavily insulting each other on the matter, the men finally decided to part and think individually.

Unfortunately, that change didn’t bring much of improvement as well - instead of being destructed by mockery, Dr. Venture was destructed by the same unease he had borne since the previous evening. Trying to gather his thoughts, the scientist laid the book down and rubbed tired eyes.

“Hey,” the familiar voice called quietly, and Rusty raised his head, watching Brock getting down on the floor next to him. “Hey,” the smaller man answered touchily, covering up with crossed arms.

The bodyguard sighed “Okay, let’s get this over with,” and turned his head towards the friend, proceeding “I was wrong. Shouldn’t have said the thin’ out loud”.

Rusty squinted his eyes for a second and then chortled slightly “Is it your way of saying sorry?”

“Yeap,” the blond man grinned back. “Ya won’t get any better than this one, though”.

“Sure thing,” Rusty agreed and lowered his arms, weakening defence. He could never pout at Brock for a long time, and even the slightest admission of guilt from him would be good enough. After all, the man had known about Rusty’s little secret all along and still had been fine working for him and hanging out with him. On second thought, it was actually a huge thing to know about.

“Anyway,” the scientist smiled awkwardly, “who didn’t do mistakes in college, right?”

The bodyguard looked back at Dr. Venture with a stone-cold seriousness on his face. “Even if it wasn’t a mistake, who would care,” he shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal at all. But for Rusty it was. At least it had been for a long time, and someone like Brock wouldn’t understand how an outsider and a family failure felt. 

“Like you’re the one to talk, Mister Womanizer,” the scientist scoffed back. “You surly aren’t the one to constantly be in conflict with your manliness and public image”.

Brock didn’t reply right away on the bitter remark, but rather took his time to weight it up. For some reason, he treated the matter as if he did care. “Listen, Doc,” he finally raised his head up and looked in Rusty’s face. “I’ll probably regret telling ya this but… Well, there was one time when I was into a guy in college too”.

The wheels were turning inside the scientist’s braincase intensively, trying to match all the facts and testimonies. Everything the man knew about his bodyguard was contradicting the very idea of him liking anyone but a woman, so, obviously, it must have been a stupid joke. “Oh, stop pulling my leg, Brock!.. I’ve almost believed you,” Rusty snapped and rolled his eyes.

“I’m not,” the agent denied and moved closer to Dr. Venture as the talk between them got a bit more intimate. “Fuck… I even used to jerk off thinkin’ ‘bout him”.

The hysteria came out of nowhere. Desperately, Rusty was trying to hold it back – he covered his mouth with both hands, drawing eyebrows together in a hopeless attempt, while something warm and tingling was overflowing his chest, making his eyes wet. He tried so hard, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t stop himself from laughing like a fool, throwing his head back insanely.

“Stop it,” Brock sizzled and elbowed Dr. Venture’s ribs, probably, harder than he had supposed to.

“Ouch,” the other man folded his torso in pain, still laughing quietly and sweeping tears of joy from his eye. “I’m sorry, Brock, that’s… just out of this world” the man admitted, fanning himself with his hand. 

“If you even dare to let it slip…” the bodyguard started.

“… who would care, right?” Rusty winked and, seeing the warning expression on Brock’s face, hurried to add up “I’m joking, Okay? Of course, I won’t tell anyone about your… bi-preferences”.

“Jesus, Doc, I only liked _one_ guy, that’s it,” the blond man clarified with irritation. “And if someone’s AC-DC here, it’s definitely you”.

Rusty stretched his arms above the head humming “I don’t know… I still believe it was mostly a college mistake”.

“And I still don’t care ‘bout your… life choices till you are you, Doc”.

It was the most reassuring thing Rusty had heard lately, and he was grateful for it. He really was, even though he didn’t believe it to be the truth. “Thanks, I guess,” the man smiled slightly.

The conversation almost came to its natural end but was interrupted by an angry yell across the room. “Do your fucking job!” Ryan freaked out, and Brock raised his fist up, nodding in the man’s direction and inwardly asking if he should be taught a lesson. “Nah,” Dr. Venture shook his head negatively. “He’s right. I’m sick of being stuck in here too. But… now I have an idea”.

Without further ado, Rusty got up and came to the machine, bringing the samples with him. He followed it from the one side to the other and opened up the only compartment that could be suitable for test materials – indeed, he was on the right pass, as there were holders for the tubes inside. After settling the samples, he strolled back to the centre of the panel and gazed at the huge green button in the middle of it. “Yeah, looks right to me,” the man murmured to himself and pressed it. The testing tubes lowered down and the machine started working, printing out the report right away. Ryan definitely looked puzzled watching this happening.

One hour later the test was complete. Rusty looked briefly through the mile of paper and decided that it could be examined later, in a way convenient place and under better circumstances. So, business had been done, and people started packing their stuff.

The agents were first to be ready; they left the bags in the lab and went outside to check on the weather and situation overall – the vehicles would probably need to be dug out from the snow. Rusty, who had finished with his backpack as well and had already put on the protection suit, was looking at his colleague tiredly - Ryan was taking much more time than anyone else.

“Are you ready or what?” Dr. Venture asked in a whining voice. “Ah, fucking zipper got jammed,” was the reply. “I’ll be in a minute or so”.

Not willing to witness any more of this embarrassment, Rusty simply threw the bag on his shoulder and joined Brock outside - it would definitely be more fun than staying with an asshole like Cox.

The strong gust of wind blew right into the scientist’s face as he stepped outdoors, thick wall of snowflakes making him squint. The man glanced at the skimobiles – they were almost completely covered with snow. "We'll have to wait till the blizzard stopes!" the names agent shouted from the distance. "And then we could dig them out".

"And what about…" Rusty started shouting back and then his eyes suddenly grew bigger "the wolfs?!" The man could distinctly see several beasts getting closer to the snowmobile’s stand – but what worse, they weren’t your regular canis lupus, they were radioactive mutants. Dr. Venture yipped and sharply turned around to retreat to the building. However, the doors locked right before his eyes.

Everything happened pretty quickly after that. One of the wolfs attacked the agent who was behind the vehicles, biting his arm right off with the horrendous fangs, blood spilling everywhere, unhuman screaming echoing through the air. Rusty clenched his teeth and kept banging on the door shouting "Open up, you, idiot!" But it didn’t help.

Seeing no easy way out of the situation, the man turned around in hope to find any other possible means to escape. Two OSI agents were already lying dead on the ground, besides the three murdered wolfs.

"Doc, just stay where you are!" the bodyguard ordered, wrestling with the biggest wolf of the pack on the ground, while the only other alive agent was firing his gun at the beast in front of him.

Too bad, the man wasn’t fast enough to look behind and another mutant jumped on his back, chomping on the agent’s neck. The man was gone, but the wolf wasn’t satisfied with chewing the dead, as right before its eyes there was another prey alive. The beast made a growl, peering at Dr. Venture, who swallowed hard and then glanced at his right with lightning speed - Brock was still rolling on the snow with the alpha. When the man looked back, the predator pulled away and rushed to his side.

The wolf was drastically approaching, and Rusty saw the only one thing he could do - as a scarred hare he bounced from the porch, falling to the ground and sliding towards the dead agent’s gun. Without hesitation, he grabbed it and turned around to face the enemy - the beast’s jaws flickered few inches away from the scientist’s face, and then he shot.

At the beginning Rusty didn’t comprehend, how the animal’s body could possibly be thrown to the side while the barrel had been aimed forward. And only few moments later he realized, that it wasn’t a gun, but a raw force of Brock attacking the beast from his right. The bodyguard didn’t play games and finished the wolf in a blink of an eye, leaving it lying here, on the snow, with red blood all over the white canvas and green saliva coming out of its opened mouth.

"Y’all right here?" Brock got up from the ground and looked around to make sure there weren’t any more of the beasts left.

"I think… I think I am" Rusty mumbled still hugging the gun and resting on the snow. He slowly leaned on his elbows and looked down at himself to verify his "allrightness".

"Hmm, Brock,” the man called out. “I think I got… scratched". Blood heavily dripping out of his leg didn’t suggest it was just a scratch.

"Let me see," the bodyguard came closer and carefully moved the torn fabric away to examine the wound. "Doesn’t look good".

"I hope, it didn’t have rabies," Rusty remarked sarcastically, and then turned back to the other man. "Listen, Brock, this jerk Cox has locked up inside the lab and won’t open the door. Our emergency kits are still in there".

"Okay, we’ll see what I can do," the blond man hummed and headed to the entrance.

Unfortunately, the doors were too strong to be busted even for Brock, and his threats didn’t have the wanted effect on the locked-up scientist. So, not wasting any more of the precious time, the bodyguard started handling the wound with things they got at hand – he managed to find somewhat clean cloth to make a tourniquet and a tight bandage out of it. After that had been done, Brock contacted the base – apparently, the blizzard was too heavy, so the reinforcement could be sent only after the weather would improve.

"Well. We have to head back on our feet," the bodyguard decided, not willing to take a chance on driving in such conditions with a wounded person in the back.

"I don’t know about that," Rusty smiled bitterly. "Unless..."

Brock didn’t need to hear any more - after all, he had known Dr. Venture for about twenty years. And let’s be honest, he wouldn’t make the man walk with that wound anyway. So, he easily grabbed Rusty like he was a snowflake, holding him bridal style, and asked "Is it me or have you giant a bit of weight?"

An hour had passed, and two men didn’t make it even a half way back. Although the crazy blizzard had ended, it still was tiresome enough to make the way through the thick layers of snow, even if Brock’s burden was pretty light. And as the bodyguard was purposefully fighting with the snowdrifts, Rusty was leaning closer to the man, trying to get as much heat as possible - his limbs had started to numb pretty quickly out of the luck of movement. Well, at least, the pain wasn’t as noticeable as it could have been, that’s what the wounded man thought. 

Brock’s chest was slowly going up and down as the agent was breathing deeply, while Rusty was listening to his even heartbeat as if had been enchanted. The musky smell of the other man was hitting close to home and, along with the blood lose, soothing the lightheaded scientist to sleep, which probably wouldn’t be a good idea. Resistance proved to be rather fruitless, so Dr. Venture had almost lost his touch with the reality when the approaching roar came out from the distance.

Rusty raised up his head at the sound and discerned the OSI snowmobile heading their way. "All right,” the blond man stopped, waiting for the vehicle to get closer. “We are borrowing this," he declared while the scientist simply pouted at the thought of leaving a warm and comforting place next to his bodyguard’s heart.

Seeing people in the middle of nowhere, the driver dropped the speed and, finally, made a stand near the survivors. Brock briefly informed the men about the situation and the juniors gladly agreed to handle over their snowmobile. That was an honor to lend a help to a more experienced agent, and especially to a legendary Swedish killing machine.

"You should be careful, sir," the driver warned, when Brock was getting on the front sit. "There is a clash between the forces".

"A what?.." Dr. Venture asked tiredly, being already over the whole Alaska thing.

"We don’t have time for this, Doc,” the bodyguard cut out firmly. “Anyway, thanks, kids," he threw out to the OSI men and pressed the gas.

The skimobile did its work, and soon enough the super-scientist and his bodyguard rushed into the base building (actually, the one to rush was Brock, because Rusty preferred to make himself comfortable in another man’s arms again). And, when they entered the first level, they could distinctly hear the familiar high-pitch voice announcing through the speakers "No one can kidnap the b… the archenemy of the Maihmhm!.." Obviously, the man’s ranting was shut up by someone, but Brock didn’t really care, and the scientist only rolled his eyes.

Without further delay the bodyguard headed to the doctor’s cabinet – of course, he remembered the scheme of the building and didn’t need any directions. On the way, they fortunately passed by Dr. Venture’s room and quickly took his belongings with them.

It wasn’t a surprise to find the cabinet empty – apparently, the stuff wasn’t on duty because of the clash. "I guess, I’ll have to fix ya up myself, Doc," the bodyguard stated and carried the wounded man inside the room. In the center of it there was a medical couch, that’s where Rusty was instantly put on.

"Listen, Brock," the scientist watched the larger man washing his hands. "You absolutely have to find me some anesthetic before doing anything". 

The man just sighed in return - like he had ever used those in similar situations. "I’m not a fucking doctor,” he protested. “Anesthetic like what?"

"May be some morphine or whatsoever," the scientist shrugged. Quite frankly, he had a low threshold for pain and had even operated on himself several times, but at the time he felt like being a bit of capricious. 

Brock sneered and paced a metal tray with tools near the coach "Morphine, really?.. Your leg wasn’t bitten off, Doc. You can manage without anesthesia just fine".

"Do you really want to hear me screaming bloody murder, Brock?.."

After few second of thinking the blond man started opening all the drawers in the cabinet, and then he switched to the small cooling chamber. "Okay, that will do," he decided getting a bottle of lidocaine out and filled the syringe with it.

“How about a deal – you hold your naggin’ when I’m cleaning the wound, and after that ya’ll got this?”


	8. Honey, I’m home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey, there! Glad to see you're back (=  
> Finally, I'm bringing some M stuff in the fanfic. My-oh-my! It's the first time I'm posting such a thing - so, please, enjoy ^^.  
> BTW - from this moment on, I suppose, it is getting funnier. And there are about 2-3 chapters left until the end.  
> P.S. - kudos and comments inspire me <3 And even a guest can leave a kudo!  
> Warnings:  
> please, don't use this fiction like an instruction in any aspect of you life (for example, self-treatment).

The jet had taken off.

They were leaving Alaska, hopefully, for good. To be honest, Rusty still couldn’t completely comprehend that it was actually happening. Everything seemed a little blurry to him, like in a dream. And like in a dream he let things happen on their own, being just a silent watcher for a moment. Indeed, the scientist felt pretty weird, which wouldn’t be a surprise after the blood loss and the usage of anesthesia on an empty stomach.

The talk on the other side of the cockpit seemed irrelevant at the time, and the words were only partly processed by the wounded man’s brain, while he was staring at the window.

“… yeah, iodine. Listen, it went fine, but…” Brock spoked into the headset’s microphone and glanced at Rusty – the scientist was leaning on the glass with his forehead. “You still better check on him anyway, Billy. Okay, later”.

“Hey, Doc,” the bodyguard called out gently after finishing talking to Billy. “You’re fine?”

“I guess, I am,” the man didn’t turn his head from the view, still drifting in his thoughts. “It’s just… so beautiful”.

Outside the cabin, the darkened sky was glowing with lights, quaint ribbons of neon green and hot pink dancing over it. It was a breathtaking scene, making one shiver with emotions never experienced before. The aurora was bewitching him – its rays forming bizarre and familiar silhouettes. “Hm, didn’t know polar lights could look like… what’s that, George Michael? How marvelous”.

“Should’ve used smaller dosage,” Brock mumbled overlooking the dark gray sky with a raised brow. He stretched out at the back to find a bottle of water and a protein bar. “Here, have some of that and… well, try to sleep or something. It’s gonna take at least three hours”.

“Oh… thank you, Brock,” Rusty smiled slightly while taking the offering. “You’re such a lamb”.

He sipped from the bottle and turned back to the window, the flow of the man’s pondering taking another twist. Brock.

Hmm, Brock… He was a true die-hard, a henchman-killing machine, a model agent. This is what everyone else saw in the man, but for the Ventures he was so-so much more. He was a loyal friend. He was a guardian angel. He was family. And one simply couldn’t resist falling for such a man at least a little, right?.. Especially Rusty, who had never thought that someone like Brock would be actually hanging out with him, sharing a laugh here and there.

That man… Had he really known Rusty’s dirty secret all along, hadn’t he?.. And still he hadn’t quitted, hadn’t been avoiding him, hadn’t insulted him. He was a saint. A beautiful blood thirsty saint.

But who could ever think that Brock, of all people, was the open-minded one?.. Wearing 80s mullet, listening to the rock dinosaurs, being a typical masculinity model from the past… All this had made the scientist miss the most obvious thing - his bodyguard didn’t give much shit about LGBT people. He didn’t mind working with sassy Shore Leave, he didn’t care about Rusty sucking dicks in college, he had even accepted Hunter’s phase of being trans.

And then it was the moment when it finally hit Dr. Venture – if Brock had actually never cared about Rusty being straight, or bi, or gay, he had very likely believed that the scientist had continued his secret adventures out of colleague as well, while in reality the closeted man had been blinded by the fear of unacceptance all this years, trying to fight against his nature. But… unacceptance from whom? If even Brock didn’t give a damn, then the rest of the modern world wouldn’t as well. Moreover, people tended to be more accepting towards wealthy guys, which Dr. Venture kind of was.

All those twisted thoughts were giving Rusty headache. He felt exhausted, he couldn’t understand himself – too many things had happened in two days. The scientist closed his eyes inhaling deeply – he needed to sleep. Everything would get better after a little nap. 

*** 

It was about nine in the evening when the jet smoothly landed on the top of the VenTech building. Rusty was still quietly snoring, resting his temple on the window with his glasses sitting on the forehead. Awkwardly enough, Brock found the scientist rather cute this way – his body childishly curled up in the chair, relaxed face and, which was rather essential to keep the cuteness, his mouth was zipped.

But even if the bodyguard hadn’t wanted to wake the man up, it was time to go. There still could be some health consequences because of the possible infections, or overstimulation, or something else that agent hadn’t thought about. After all, Dr. Venture’s health was the bodyguard’s priority – that’s why the scientist needed to be checked by Billy as soon as possible, so Brock shook the other man’s shoulder firmly with a brief explanation “New York”.

“What?..” Rusty bent away from the jet’s side, looking all mixed-up, the glasses falling down on his nose obliquely.

“I said, we’re in New York, Doc,” the bodyguard repeated switching off the control panel. “Better show ya to Billy. He said he’d be waintin’ in the Tower”.

“Ah, right,” Rusty coughed and followed other man unbuckling. “Maybe he could prescribe me some painkillers”. 

“Yeah, sure,” the other man replied and grabbed Dr. Venture peremptorily. “If it won’t make ya see med goblins again, Doc”. 

Five minutes more and the elevator brought them to the lab, where an examination table had been placed quite long ago. Billy and White were there too – one sleeping with his face down on the tabletop, and the other – playing a videogame on an office computer.

“Are you serious?!..” Dr. Venture yelled, making both of his friends jump out of surprise. “Is that what you were doing when I was gone?”

“But it’s not working hours,” the albino noted with a subtle hand gesture.

“So… what are you doing here than, Pete?” Rusty attacked back in a cold-blooded voice of an angry mother, while being placed on the table. Obviously, the scientist was in the mood – he felt like he was about to have a breakdown. Headache, nausea and overall exhaustion accompanied by the nagging pain in the thigh didn’t make him a pleasurable person at all.

“Well… look at the other side, Rust. We’ve finished the reassembling of the Go-pad,” White replied simply avoiding the question, and Brock, who had backed off to the end of the room and had gotten comfortable in a chair, turned his head around with interest or rather perplexity.

“Right,” Billy agreed, helping Dr. Venture to pull down the pants. “You know, the changes you’ve made to the scheme are rather smart. We’ve ran few lab tests - none has failed so far”.

“Ha, I’ve told you we still got it,” Rusty smirked slightly.

With that being said, the neurogeneticist started examining his patient. He briefly inspected the condition of the stitched wound for swelling or atypically redness around the closure, and after that checked Dr. Venture’s general state – temperature, blood pressure, pupils’ reaction and all that stuff.

“Everything looks fine,” Billy summed up and switched on applying a wound dressing. “I don’t see any sights of infection. So… you know the drill. Good sleep, nutrition, acetaminophen… I guess, we still have some Tylenol left”.

In no time Master Quizboy finished bandaging and, while Rusty was dealing with clothing himself, got a bottle of analgesic out. White, being a good assistant he was, had fetched a glass of water, so the wounded man could take a pill right away. 

***  
For Brock the whole adventure since the wolfs’ encounter to the Rusty’s examination had passed as swiftly as a new episode of a favorite tv-show. When the bodyguard was on a duty and there was a real threat, his professional sense of responsibility (and, let’s be honest, his congenital addiction to adrenaline) overcame all other emotions. He was an agent, it was his primary job to protect the Ventures, and he was great at it.

But, after all, the mission had been over, and Brock had to deal with his casual life, which was a completely different topic. That night the man couldn’t help himself not to stare into the ceiling while lying in a bed quite for some time – why did everything have to be so complicated out of the work? But he had to make the final decision right here, right there. And it wouldn’t be the easy one. Would he distance himself from Rusty yet again, occupying free time with nameless women, cigarettes and alcohol, blaming his desires on a middle-age crisis, or would he go for the unknown and try to make a move on his ward?..

Being known as a tough guy, famous Casanova, probably the manliest man in the whole OSI was a thing to be reckoned with. Reputation. Respect. Self-identifying. And at the same time, there was no mistake, Brock had been missing the wacky scientist with his ridiculous ability to get in trouble. He had been missing those occasional remarks relevant only for them both. He had just been missing seeing the familiar face every day at breakfast for some reason. Falling out of this family habits had dearly affected the man. And, obviously, there also was _that_ feeling. That erratic burning rolling down his chest right to the crotch.

Brock scoffed at the sudden awareness – this wasn’t a matter of choice as the choice had already been made at the same very moment when the man had shared his secret of college crush with Rusty. Inevitably, it had been the first little step towards the acceptance of his true nature and subliminal intentions.

So, the real question was “how”. How in the hell to hit on a guy? Or, specifically, how to hit on Dr. Venture saving face? If the scientist were a random woman, this wouldn’t be an issue whatsoever. Damn, if he was at least some stranger man, for whom Brock felt nothing but lust, it wouldn’t be as complicated. But here they were, bonded together by the most important aspects of live – work, friendship, family. In such circumstances any fail would probably be a loss at the war.

For sure, Brock couldn’t just jump on the man like he usually did with women. First of all, women almost always showed their interest openly when it came to Samson. And Rusty… well, Rusty was an attention-deficit-affected pain in the arse. Brock couldn’t really tell if the man was just acting like a spoiled child, looking for approvement and recognition (which the agent had used to believe in), or if Dr. Venture was actually seeking for something more intimate than that. So, yeah, no clear answer to the question if Rusty had ever looked at the bodyguard as a mating material. And, in this situation, Brock wasn’t really sure where to start - the only gay interaction he had experienced had been nothing less but a third base. It had happened only once back in the college. And it had kind of gotten out of hand.

Anyway, the bodyguard needed a slower and more gentle approach with the scientist, and for Brock it was something quite new, because he had never really tried to be less impulsive and more… romantic (this word by itself made the man’s eye twitch). But the mission was clear after all – he needed to show his interest unobtrusively yet still obviously, so that the scientist would expose his feelings as well and, if the adult affection wouldn’t be mutual, they would simply pretend everything to be a joke. As simple in theory as that.

After the long evening full of reflections the decision had been made. Finally, the feeling of control was returning back into Brock’s life, so the man found it much easier to relax and, eventually, fell asleep with the strong desire to wake up next day and handle things right.  
***  
He was stupid, so, so, stupid!.. He should’ve understood that there had been something wrong all along. It wasn’t in Dylan’s habit to feed a client free booze before offering blunts. And now the candyman was holding Rusty by the T-shirt, shaking him abruptly with a rage on the red face. Two tough-looking goons, that the young Venture had seen for the first time, were towering over behind the leader.

“I fuckin’ know it was you, bitch! Don’t even try to tell me it wasn’t you. You, little shit!” the man yelled into Rusty’s face, veins pumping on his neck. Clearly, Dylan had been on something much stronger than your usual grass. The smaller man swallowed realizing that his chances to leave the bathroom in one untouched piece were rapidly going down the drain. 

“Come on, Dee”, Rusty mumbled and his lips twisted into a pathetic excuse for a smile. “You know me, I don’t even do snow white”. 

“Don’t you Dee me, motherfucker,” the pusher snapped back and pulled Rusty up to whisper into his ear “who do ya thing I fuckn’ am? Your friend or something?.. Cut off with this bullshit”. He grinned complacently and, without any hesitation, threw the unfortunate pothead across the room and into the tiled wall.

“Ya’ve already sold it, haven’t ya?” Dylan asked rhetorically, while playing with the wallet he had managed to get out before tossing the other man down. He sneered once again and looked inside with anticipation.

“What the?..” the candyman got few small notes out and let the wallet drop. His sudden expression of disbelieve swiftly went back to anger. “I’ve asked you - what the fuck is it, bitch?!”

Rusty, still chilling on the floor, raised his head up. After all the alcohol and weed (weed, which had been, probably, mixed up with something else) he was rather slow and felt a bit out of the reality. And, apparently, the very effect of those substances had just crept up on the man, because he started laughing.

“Oh, man, I’m so rude!.. Meet my friends George and Abraham. So sorry, Benjamin couldn’t make it,” the red-haired man quipped. “Haven’t I told you it wasn’t me, fucking morons!”

“You’re gonna regret sayin’ this,” Dylan hissed and punched his palm with a fist in a garish gesture. The show was about to begin, but what this show would be no one could really imagine.

As the group of three was about to start moving to their victim, the bathroom door swooshed opened by the powerful kick from the outside. The goons were instantly smashed together forehead to forehead and then pitched as a fastball into the doorway one after another. The candyman himself wasn’t so lucky and got an intimate encounter with the toilet bowl – obviously, Rusty couldn’t see what was going on in the stall, but after a while Dylan crawled out wet, bloody and shaking and led himself out of the room.

The stranger straightened up, not looking at the red-haired man who had kept seating against the wall during the beating. Without all those flickering movements, Rusty could properly study the unexpected savior – broad-shouldered, above average tall, with blond messy hair and a reminder of recent outburst on the face. Within a second this man turned to the hophead and stretched his hand out, offering help. In another scenario, if Rusty hadn’t been that wasted, he’d probably think that the scrapper was coming after him next. But, instead of curling up on the floor in a defensive pose, the smaller man reached his hand out back. Shortly after that he was gotten up with a single heave, stumbling out of nothing, and accidently pressing to the blonde’s chest, which was quite enjoyable. The savior grunted and took Rusty by the shoulders, pushing the smaller man away and leaning him against the bathroom stall.

“You should knock it off,” the stranger said sullenly and took out a cigarette.

Rusty chuckled back “Knock off what exactly?” and earned a disapproving look from the other guy.

“Getting’ fuckin’ stoned in a shithole like that,” he took a good ol’ drag and breathed the smoke out. Damn, he looked fine. “Not like I care, but… you could die there, ya know”.

The smaller man smirked at the suggestion. Yeah, it would be a downer to croak by the hand of some average assholes while having the past of a boy-adventurer. “Hah, yeah, that would be unfortunate,” Rusty agreed. “Right… Fuck this place. I can blaze in the dorm, anyway”.

The cigarette had almost burnt down, and after it turned to a butt the handsome stranger would clearly walk out of the door and never show up in Rusty’s life again. It would be such a wasted opportunity. And young Venture wasn’t the one to miss it. So, without a second thought, he pulled away and, as elegant as he could in a chonged state, came over to snatch the stoge from the blonde’s hand.

“What the F?..” the scrapper tried to protest watching Rusty, who was taking an unreasonably long drag with his eyes closed, lashes barely fluttering behind the glasses.

“I can’t leave my knight in shining armor without a reward, right,” the rescued guy confessed softly, putting the cigarette out on the wall. They were so close now, that Rusty could clearly smell the scent of alcohol, sweat and blood around the other man. And then, unpredictably nimbly for a stoner, he undid his savior’s belt.

“When did you?!..” the only thing the blonde had managed to ask before Rusty got on his knees and actually pulled the guy’s dick out. Taking his time, young Venture made a sloppy lick from the base to the very tip. “You’ve got a nice piece there,” he smiled looking up at the confused stranger, who didn’t answer back. But yet he didn’t resist as well. And at this point, the silence and the hardened cock of the blonde could only be interpreted as a consent, so there was nothing else to do for Rusty but to go to town.

And he was good at this. He knew that the grater the tension were, the pleasurable release would be. So he took it slow, sliding his tongue up the shaft once again, wetting it with more saliva and enjoying the uneven breathing somewhere from above. Just for a minute, Rusty had pulled away, raising his head up, and started making rhythmic strokes to get the guy going. When the blonde’s dick was iron hard, young Venture put his mouth on the tip, sucking it gently, swirling the tongue around it. He moaned quietly, as his rescuer had shivered being taking in completely. Rusty was genially savoring this feeling of sudden control over the other man. The awareness of what he was doing to this huge-ass guy made tingles run down to his groin. So, he kept moving his mouth up and down, using the hand in unison, trying to stimulate the whole length of the engorged dick, giving attention to each and every part of it, fondling man’s balls with the other hand and whimpering just like a slut. He loved it. And the blonde had already been so revved up, that he was twitching all over with every stroke. He was damn close.

Finally, with a desperate smokey groan, the guy cummed, filling the other’s mouth with himself, still panting and shivering. Rusty had been sorely turned on as well by now, which was rather unusual to him during a simple blowjob. His untoward cock was begging for attention, bulging underneath the tight pants, which the man wanted to hide – after all, he had always enjoyed being only a giver with other males, not trusting any of them to go further.

So, Rusty rapidly stood up, and, not even looking on the orgasmed guy, leaped to the sink to calm himself down - blood was pumping in his ears like crazy. He had really overdone it with the weed this time, he thought while turning the cold water on, and splashed it on his face.

When he opened his eyes, the stranger had already been gone. And, surprisingly, Rusty wasn’t in the bathroom anymore. Instead, he opened his eyes to find himself awoken in his own bed after having this confusing dream again. A dream, that he couldn’t even remember, and which was nothing more than the man’s brain trying to put together the events of one long-passed night.

It had happened in collage. That day he’d smoked too much of weed, combining it with cocktails, and had experienced a major brown out. The only thing he remembered was that he’d almost got bitten up to death and had been saved by some random person. Everything else was kind of a blur - Rusty couldn’t even recollect what this person had looked like. And, strangely enough, every time he had a dream like this one, he ended up being awake with a solid boner. 

Dr. Venture uttered a little moan and slid deeper into the comfort of the warm sheets, turning on the stomach, but someone kept on banging at the door with remarkable persistence. 

"It’s twelve am, Doc," the familiar rough voice insisted, and the intruder walked in. "Ya wanted to wake up in the morning, remember? And what’s happened with that JJ alarm?"

"In Alaska it’s still nine, so you can leave me be unless there is an apocalypse or worth," the scientist disagreed like a petulant child, showing no intent to get up and covering his head with a blanket. “And, yes, I’ve finally turned it off”.

“Well,” Rusty could feel the notes of irritation in the bodyguard’s voice. "If ya don’t get up now, your breakfast will go right into the trash". 

Just for a second, Dr. Venture kept silence, comprehending what Brock was talking about. "Wait… you have fetched me a breakfast, haven’t you?" the man asked, and his nose slowly showed out from the pile of sheets. Yawning, the scientist raised up his torso, leaning on the bed back with his shoulders, ready to find out if he had been tricked. But he hadn’t. Brock was actually standing next to the bed with a little folding table in hands. 

"Ow, I thought it was just a scratch," Rusty noted with uneasy surprise, because the bodyguard usually cared for him like that when things were pretty bad. “Brock. Please, be honest. Is there… something I don’t know?” the smaller man asked, while the bodyguard was settling the table. The latter tensed instantly at the question. “Do I have to get my leg amputated or something?”

“What?..” Brock frowned in confusion and then his face relaxed again. “No. You’re gonna be fine, Doc”. 

"So… You’re just turning into a big softie then, hah?" Rusty teased, still not sure how else he could react to this sudden attention. He didn’t want to show that he’d enjoyed it much more that he should have - obviously, for Brock it was nothing more than a professional move or, possibly, a friendly gesture.

“You know, it’s a little bit cold,” the scientist acted up, making the other man roll his eyes. "Couldn’t you like, microwave it, Brock?"

"Nah, don’t wanna get any softer," the bodyguard remarked grumpily, folding his arms, and left Rusty to have his meal alone.

Well, breakfast in bed had been a lost cause. Apparently, it looked quite casual for Dr. Venture, because, let’s be real, Brock had spoiled him with alike things in the past. Maybe he needed a less subtle approach after all.

*** 

It was the afternoon, when Rusty watch-called the bodyguard and asked to be led to the OSI office. The scientist had finished analyzing the results of the samples testing and wanted to hand over his report. As a matter of fact, Brock had offered to collect those papers and bring them to the general himself, but Dr. Venture had been skeptical about this.

“I’m sure Gathers would like to hear my verbal and less scientific summary,” Rusty raised a hand as he and the agent were waiting for the elevator. Of course, the man also didn’t want to seat at one place the whole time after having a highly active morning routine for days. 

“Ahh, by the way,” the scientist coughed while entering the cabin. “I’m having a date with the Monarch tomorrow”. 

Brock was a bit surprised to hear this – Rusty usually tried to postpone displeasing events for as long as he could. “Have to clean up my father’s mess as always,” Dr. Ventures rolled his eyes. Yeap, here was the typical-Rusty reaction.

“Okay,” the bodyguard kind of agreed and then, still looking straight ahead at the elevator’s doors, asked unobtrusively “so, are ya really keeping the beard?”

As by a reflex, the smaller man stroked his thick facial hair and hummed. “It kind of makes me look more masculine and stylish, you know. What do you think?”

Brock only shrugged in hesitation with a simple “Meh”. The beard may be looked good on his ward, but it wasn’t practical, if you know what I mean.

“Whaaaat?” Rusty tapped the other man’s arm, resenting the answer.

“I just thought ya’d go back to your gotie, Doc”, the bodyguard sighed, while the doors were opening, and left the elevator. 

The scientist followed him shortly, trying to walk as carefully as he could to decrease any possibilities of feeling the pain. “Phhh, don’t be a fuddy-duddy,” he threw out, making Brock frown here for a second in disbelief. Obviously, a person who would actually use a “fuddy-duddy” in a sentence were the one.

Anyhoo, after getting on the desired level the men parted - Rusty proceeded to the hall accompanied by a secretary, while Brock joined his OSI boys. The agents were preoccupied with their usual business while having nothing to do - gambling, drinking and gossiping. The whole lot of the latter was provided by Shore Leave, of course, although he wasn’t the only one to like chatting.

“So, how are you doin’?” the sassy agent greeted when Brock came around the table.

“Fine,” he replied simply and nodded to the Sky Pilot nonverbally saying to be dealt the cards as well. 

Shore Leave hummed and put his arms up on the head, getting into a resting pose “How was your little trip to the Northern Hell? I personally was fuckin’ bored yet again”.

“Nah,” Brock replied while looking at the hand he’d been given. Obviously, he didn’t pay much attention to the conversation. “At least some piece of action”.

“Sure thing,” the other agent chuckled, “your sugar daddy’s still walking funny. I bet he had a hard time”.

The bodyguard only hummed at that. And then he raised up his head. “Hold on, do you mean…” the blonde straightened up with bulged eyes. “Mutant wolfs! He’s got bitten by a mutant wolf! Nothing fuckin’ else”.

“Wow, wow, wow,” Shore Leave waved his hands dramatically. “Keep your dirty thought to yourself, Captain Mullet-head,” he laughed and then, almost instantly, added up “Come on, I’m just kidding!.. You know me”.

“This kind of jokes got people killed,” Brock hissed, trying to tone it down.

And on this note the so-called banter had ended, letting the agents to begin their game. It was about third round when the scientist left Hunter’s office and approached the bodyguard to exchange a few words on the matter. The funniest thing was that Gathers himself hadn’t expected that the machine for testing had still been working - well, at least due to his reaction.

After sharing his thoughts, Rusty had almost decided to leave for work, but, instead, he turned around and addressed Shore Leave thoughtfully “So. How do you like my beard?”

“Who, me?..” the sassy man specified, not really sure why his opinion on the matter could suddenly became interesting for someone like Dr. Venture.

“Of course, I’m looking at you,” Rusty rolled his eyes and proceeded “I’m just curious what a gay guy may think”.

“Huh, I guess, it’s fine,” Shore Leave shrugged with perplexity on his face.

The scientist suddenly smirked and pointed an index up, like he had discovered something significant. “A-ha! Check and mate,” he yelled and, pleased with himself, left the others in awkward silence. 

***  
The rest of the day went pretty smoothly for Rusty - he met up with Billy and White to discuss some possible projects he had come up with during his Alaskan imprisonment in free time. They needed to choose the proper ones and to toss the probable market-disaster or something badly realizable. Surly, selected inventions had to be consumer-oriented and not too revolutionary, so the beloved OSI wouldn’t interfere again.  
In the late evening, when Rusty eventually had been done with work, the whole Venture family had a nice little supper together, it seemed that the boys had somewhat missed their dad. And, surprisingly, they both were in a good mood - Hank was talking about his progress at the car service, Dean was eager to share that he had started taking chemical courses with Jared, and, what was even more important, they didn’t try to kill each other during the family reunion.

It seemed that life was finally getting it together.


	9. Let’s play a game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi, hello, good day, I'm here again!  
> Thank you for your patience (っ˘з(˘⌣˘ ) ♡  
> It takes no less than 2 weeks for me to write a chapter, because I appreciate my readers and want the text to be readable. I check the draft many times, so I'm sure it's okay (not straight up awful xd).  
> Anyways, I guess it's about 2 or 3 chapters left (I've reconstructed the plot a bit at the end).  
> Hope you'll enjoy this chapter! It's getting funnier, I guess (=

Warm water was falling on the man’s temple and running down his spine slowly, the sound of it pleasant and peaceful. At the time there was nothing better than to close your eyes and turn the face to this stream, giving out to inexplicable feelings and leaving any thoughts behind. It was so easy and so natural just to stand like that and being yourself, enjoying the moment carelessly. Too bad, the wound couldn’t stay wet for any longer, otherwise Rusty would probably take a nice bath.

He turned off the water and stepped out of the cabin on the small rug, grabbing the terry towel to dry himself. Indeed, everything was about to get better, because for once the scientist was really working on it as an adult - healthier lifestyle, managing budget, brainstorming with Billy and Pete... Of course, some things would never change, and some things would definitely go out of control and down the toilet. Hell, there even was a great probability that Rusty would end up abandoning the whole “being-better-yourself” idea, but at least he was trying.

The man put a white robe on and tied a band around. In one fast step he approached the condensated mirror, which was instantly wiped by the sleeve, and looked at the reflection turning his head right and left. Hesitantly Rusty went through his beard with the fingers and frowned – was it only him or did the thing actually age him up a bit?.. Not mentioning, that it was harder to trim, and Rusty had already spent enough time on facial care. And, no, Venture’s change of mind hadn’t been caused by Brock’s oh-so-witty remarks during the supper. Of course not. Like he needed that kind of approval from his straight bodyguard, pffff.

“Back to the norm," Rusty whispered into the mirror and got out his shaving equipment. Ten unpalatable minutes later the man was finishing with his face by putting some calming lotion on – shaving definitely wasn’t among the things the scientists enjoyed. His skin was too sensitive.

Subtle knocking on the door had interrupted Rusty’s self-examination in the reflection. “What?” he asked the person on the other side. His voice had probably sounded rather hostile, but that was what you would expect from Dr. Venture while disturbing the man during his me-time. 

“Are you changing the bandage?” the question followed, and clearly the voice belonged to Brock. 

“Well, I am about to. Why?” Rusty came to the door and half opened it with a raised-up brow. 

"Let’s be real," as casually as it got Brock moved forward, letting himself in and making the scientist step back into the room. "When ya do it yourself, you’re always complainin’ it’s too tight or too lose. I’d better help ya out now then ‘ll have to listen to your nagging again".

Rusty leaned on the tub and smirked "Oh, it’s so thoughtful of you". It came out a bit bitter, although deep down inside the scientist knew that Brock genuinely wanted to help, like a good friend or a close family member would. And, similarly hidden in the heart, there was Dr. Venture’s gratitude for the care. It was their usual way of interaction, full of exaggeration and sarcasm. The men simply didn’t use to say nice things to each other directly. They had never known any better.

Watching Brock going through a cupboard in search of the needed stuff, the smaller man sat down and tossed one part of the robe’s skirt to the side, so there would be a straight and easy access to the wound. They’d better be done with this awkward moment as soon as possible.

Soon the blonde turned around to the bathtub with a bottle of ointment in his hand, a bandage roll put off on the sink, and glanced at Dr. Venture. Apparently, the scientist wasn’t paying attention at the moment, lost in thoughts, so Brock could shamelessly adore the thin frame of the other man’s body as Rusty was sitting on the edge, his legs crossed and his head tilted pensively to the side revealing the delicate neck. Brock’s gaze wondered down to the wounded thigh, catching the bare skin of a hip. 

Taking a deep breath, the bodyguard kneeled down to examine the stich. And believe me, right before this moment there had been only one intention in the man’s mind – to help with the dressing. And that should’ve stayed that way, even if the thought of Rusty being completely naked under the rob made a pulse of electricity run through his body.

“It’s healing all right,” Brock murmured contently at the sight of the wound and, just following the instinct, traced a gentle line parallel to the surge, far enough not to cause any pain. Surprised, Rusty shivered.

"Oh, come on, it tickles," he protested with commotion, making the other man instantly come to his senses.

Brock was frustrated. He hadn’t ever presumed it’d be so easy to lose focus and to give in to those feelings almost blindly at the point of his own hands doing the thing he hadn’t asked to do. And also it had been quite ironic for a macho like Brock to find sexual appeal in a simple curve of the exposed neck alone. Yeah, from this moment on he should try not to be that reckless with Rusty physically while the latter still wasn’t ready for it and perceived him merely as a friend and a bodyguard.

The smallest man coughed awkwardly. "Something’s wrong?" he asked with a timid concern.

"Uhh, no… No, it’s fine," the blond man reassured, his voice slightly hoarse. Yet again he tried to center attention on the main mission he had which was dealing with the wound. As a pro he spread a thin layer of vaseline upon it and then bandaged with extra care - everything had taken no more than two minutes.

"You are too good at this," Dr. Venture admitted quietly. "I mean, err... thanks for the help".

"That’s nothing, Doc," the bodyguard got up, stepping away, and rubbed his scruff. “You’ve returned to the… ya know, goatee, it’s nice” he noted uncomfortably and hurried up to leave the room, feeling himself being a bit of a fool for some reason.

But what he didn’t know was Rusty feeling the very same way (and maybe even more of a fool). He still was sitting on the tub’s corner as Brock had left, pressing a palm to his mouth, redness spreading across his checks. The whole situation didn’t make any sense to the man – after many years of the damn infatuation, after fighting with it and defeating it he simply couldn’t make the same mistake twice. And still he had got feverish and agitated by a simple check-up touching like a virgin teenager… Nah, he believed in his self-worth now, and he surly didn’t need no more useless pining in his life, thank you very much. Besides, he had more important things to worry about – for example, the business. 

***

Sonic extinguisher based on bass frequencies, smart wallpaper changing its’ color depending on the one's mood, incorporating a model of flatworm’s regeneration into medicine, renovative fast-charging batteries that would use the principle of rapid cooling… All those ideas and some more were elaborated on during the company meeting. Luckily, some of them met the requirements of VenTech’s tenets like being practical, family-friendly and potentially profitable with reasonable expenses for development. The whole hot discussion had been wrapped up after no less than three hours and, although Dr. Venture had felt rather content about the results, the meeting had taken considerably more time than he had intended it to. The scientist was running late.

As if he was on fire Rusty rushed out from the office to the lobby and started pushing the call button. He had made time for a quick snack but didn’t have enough of it to change, so he was standing there in a suit, still holding a file folder from the meeting, waiting for the elevator to lower on his level. Unbearably slowly the cabin stopped, and the doors began to slide aside.

Being impatient, Dr. Venture squeezed through the gap nimbly and hummed - Brock appeared to have taken the same ride. “I can’t believe you’ve convinced me to use the car,” Rusty threw out at him right away.

“It’s the center of NY, Doc. There’s no place to land a jet,” the bodyguard insisted eyeing his companion, who was staying close to the cabin’s wall tapping his foot anxiously. The doors had closed, and the elevator smoothly started to go down. 

“I hope your maniac driving will work miracles,” Rusty turned around to face the other man and to roll the eyes at him acting slightly defiant. “Least of all I want the Monarch to be on the rag”. 

“Don’t ya worry about that,” the agent reassured casually and leaned his elbow on the wall, looking down at the smaller man with a subtle smile, making Rusty realize that they were standing dangerously close to each other. “Ridin’ Adrienne’s much like having sex,” Brock proceeded shifting even closer and the smaller man protectively lifted the folder to cover his face up to the eyes. “Ya hop in, ya go to town and ya getting there just in the right time”.

Dr. Venture had definitely been caught off guard by the closeness and the bodyguard’s smokey tone, it took him few second to actually turn on the brains. Of course!.. Brock was simply being Brock – a natural macho, utterly secure in his ways and constantly radiating sex appeal out of nowhere. There wasn’t anything else about the man’s behavior. Fixated on the thought, Rusty pulled himself together and lowered the hands to the chest level, frowning expressively to seem more irritated than hectic.

“Can you, please, not,” he started to complain (which he knew was the best tactics ever to turn things around), when suddenly the elevator began shaking like there was an earthquake. Rusty instantly dropped the papers out of abruptness and tried to keep the balance bending back and forward and, finally, was thrown into the bodyguard yelping a simple “what the!” when the cabin stopped with a screech.

“Y’all right?” Brock asked quietly holding the scientist’s wrists in his hands just the way he had caught him earlier.

“Sure, I’m fine,” Dr. Venture mumbled staring at the other’s polished shoes, while Brock kept on clinging to Rusty. “Ummm,” the scientist raised his head up and laughed nervously. “What are you doing?.. I’m not going to fall or anything at this point.” Suddenly it felt like his heart was about to drop out of the chest at the sight of the other man towering over him and looking down right into his eyes. And then the lights went out.

Immediately, Rusty hitched away, freeing himself from the grip, and started groping for his phone. Hyperventilating was, obviously, nipped in the bud.

“Ooookay, those are the highly-advanced elevators of the biggest New York tech company, they aren’t supposed to get stuck,” the scientist rambled while lighting the panel and pushing the main entry floor button. "Not fucking today, pretty please! I don’t need this lunatic to be in a mood again," Rusty yelled pressing haphazardly the rest of the buttons and not receiving any response. 

“No signal,” Brock informed after checking on his own phone, and the scientist could feel tension in the bodyguard’s voice at once.

“What, you think someone’s done this deliberately?” the smaller man turned around, only to find the other one stretching to the emergency exit on the roof with a security keycard in his hand.

“I’m not sure yet,” Brock confessed reluctantly and nodded to the scientist. “You first?” 

“Fine,” Rusty shrugged and squatted to take up the dropped folder. His state of mind was slowly but surely getting back to normal as the interaction between him and his bodyguard had returned to being nothing more than professional again. “It’s not like I haven’t ever climbed the elevator’s shaft before any way,” he snickered and came under the opened hatch to be picked up habitually and helped reaching the top of the car. 

Without much effort, Dr. Venture pulled up and got on the elevator’s roof, looking around. There was a ladder on his right side and, apparently, it would be a good idea to climb to the next floor, which wasn’t far away. So Rusty hopped onto the thing and started going up, Brock following him shortly. Soon enough, the doors on the second floor were opened with the same keycard and the men got out into the lobby.

The scientist dusted trousers and placed his hand on a hip, looking up at the agent. Indeed, there could not be any mistake – the man beside him was Brock fucking Samson, a good old hetero male, that had slept with hundreds of women. One didn’t need any additional prove of his preferences. Although, in Rusty’s case it wouldn’t hurt to be remined once again, so the scientist smirked and boldly shoved Brock with an elbow “So, how often do you get «Fatal Attraction»* thing going on, Mr. Gallagher?”

“Not often enough,” the other man grunted with barely visible annoyance and moved to the staircase.

“So greedy,” Dr. Venture shook his head with a puff hurrying after the bodyguard.

He was pleased with himself, because, finally, he had figured it out. All this unusual attention like sudden stares and so-called accidental touches from Brock had a logical reason. And the reason was even more obvious than imagination playing tricks on Rusty - Brock was basically teasing him.

Indeed, it wasn’t uncommon for a confident straight man, whose friend had come out of the closet, to treat that exact friend a bit differently – just to show support and acceptance and maybe to somewhat reinforce domination in the pack. That was it. The puzzle had been complete. So, Dr. Venture could actually feel safer – from now on he wouldn’t subconsciously encourage false hopes (wait, what?.. no-no-no, he obviously hadn’t had those), but rather join the little game. That what a not-secretly-interested-in-his-buddy-for-about-twenty-years friend would probably do, right?

“Well, sorry, you had to stuck with me instead of a beautiful woman,” the scientist remarked sarcastically after the men had hastened to the main floor and while Brock was giving a fatherly slap to Sergeant Hatred for not doing his job right.

“Why?” the bodyguard looked at Rusty with a faint smile. “I’m not sorry for _that_ ,” he professed plainly and strode to the entrance, the scientist keeping pace with him.

“Sure,” Dr. Venture muttered in return running out of witty words and followed the agent, pouting at himself. He didn’t like losing. And especially he didn’t like losing in verbal banters, which were supposed to be his specialty. No wonder that now it became a matter of principle for Rusty to get a grip on himself and kick the game up a notch at the right time.

*** 

As soon as Brock got into the car the “on-mission” mode was turned on. He had to deliver Dr. Venture to the meeting point, and he had to do it on time. It didn’t matter if the thing was large or small, when the agent had an aim nothing could ever stop him to succeed, nothing was impossible for him.

Rusty didn’t even manage to buckle up when Brock hit the gas and the car took off harshly. With a frightened expression on the face the scientist was pressed into the cushion and tried to finish with his seatbelt quick.

Of course, the agent’s car was registered in government database as an OSI vehicle, this being said road traffic laws weren’t a problem – Brock Samson drove the engine at full speed running a red light or through the pavement, magically avoiding hitting civilians. No more than fifteen minutes and the men were at the spot, Rusty bending over a trash bin, trying not to throw up.

"Gosh, it was a huge mistake to have a smoothie before…" he groaned barely holding it in but ended up vomiting anyway. “Are we on time at least?” the scientist turned to his bodyguard after he had caught a breath and rubbed his mouth with a handkerchief.

“Sharply,” the other man checked his communicator with content. Rusty exhaled a sigh of relief and came closer to the restaurant’s window, spotting the little round table where his archenemy would be waiting.

"Yea, he’s already there," Rusty observed and then addressed Brock, who was standing right behind "so, what’s the plan? Are you going undercover or sneaking into the stuff’s facility? Or..." the smaller man stopped guessing as Brock silently moved to the entrance with a poker face and went straight inside the restaurant. He openly nodded to the Monarch with a slight raise of brows and simply sat at the corner table, where Gary in a funny outfit had already been sitting.

"..or do that," Rusty whispered to himself going inside and walked over to his brother.

“Oh, look at you,” Dr. Venture quipped immediately while sliding on the chair opposite to the Monarch’s, “your wardrobe doesn’t actually consist only of pervert latex costumes”.

“And yours of hippy-van colored rompers,” the irritated man snapped back roughly, leaning on the table with both elbows.

“Speedsuits! They are speedsuits,” Rusty yelled full of passion, drawing the unwanted attention of all the families having a lunch at the time. Awkwardly he coughed into a fist and made an apologizing grimace, so all the busybodies would contentedly return back to their business.

“Okay, now as we are finished with the mutual insults,” the scientist bent over, his eyes squinted, “what do you want?”

Being honest, he had never been afraid of the Monarch. Deeply annoyed by him – with no doubt, but not afraid. Since the very first encounters with the villain Rusty had almost instantly realized that the obsessed man wouldn’t ever try to kill him for real, rather on contrary – he would do his utmost to continue being Dr. Venture’s forever and ever pain in the ass. No surprise, that this time Rusty was expecting some kind of a sick trick from the Monarch or at least a big blowup. But, for unknown reasons, the archenemy in front of the scientist suddenly lost all the ostentatious boldness he had showed before and started drilling eyes into the table with great persistence.

“Stop freaking me out,” Rusty whined rolling his eyes after the whole minute had passed. “You know, I have better things to do than silent treatment with you,” he warned and flinched as he was about to walk away.

“No, no, no, we’re not done,” the Monarch protested immediately clenching brother’s hand and then added up barely hearable “please”. Rusty hummed, looking for the catch in this theatrical scene, but nevertheless sat back in the chair.

“Okay. I have a win-win deal for you, Dr. Venture,” the taller man said quietly after making up his mind. “The only thing is – you should promise to keep it a secret”. 

Rusty shifted a little closer and lowered the voice down as well “All right, I’m all ears”.

“Imagine that!.. I’ve never hated someone as much as you,” the Monarch began earning an are-you-for-real-right-now look from Rusty. “I mean, I’ve been hating on you since college, like… like my hate has just been the most natural and beautiful thing in the world,” the taller man confessed sincerely. “And now when I know that you are my fucking brother, I kind of… I just… Crap, I don’t want to lose the only family I’ve left, okay? I know, I know, blood relation is a shitty argument, but for me it fucking matters,” the man was gesticulating expressively while still trying to be quite. “Listen, those bloodthirsty, twisted minded jerks-villains from the Guild – most of them simply don’t know how to do arching right. No elegance, no creativity, no nothing! And you know what – one of those creeps could actually fucking kill you, Rusty, think about that!..”

“Em,” Dr. Venture drawled in frustration, getting from the Monarch’s speech that the man hated him and at the same time kind of didn’t. “Is it me or do you suggest teaming up, so we could be _not_ sworn archenemies but rather… pretend to?”

“Exactly,” the man beamed and instantly looked around with an anxious face like someone was spying on them. “Just remember that for everyone else we are arching like we mean it. So, is it a deal then or what?”

“Well, to be honest, I’m really confused. But it does sound pretty tempting”.

Out of nowhere the Monarch jumped from his place and pointed a finger at the sky (or rather at the stained ceiling). “I fucking hate you, Dr. Venture! The papers to sign will be sent immediately after this meeting is over,” he exclaimed and sat back like nothing had ever happened. “You know, I have a reputation to uphold,” he smiled awkwardly.

“Hm, you know what,” Rusty leaned back and crossed his legs feeling confident about an idea that had come to his mind. “I actually have some additional, let’s say so, requests”.

“You are shitting me, right?..” the Monarch questioned in shock only to be interrupted by a young voice of a suddenly approached waitress. 

“Good day. What will you have?” she requested, holding the notebook and a pen. At the first sight, she was an ordinary pretty girl about twenty – short skirt, high heels, blond hair in a ponytail. Probably a college student that had arrived to New York from a little town in hope of fulfilling the American dream.

“I’ve already made my order, Sweety” the villain pointed out, circling the edge of his espresso mug. 

Rusty only shrugged “Well, may be a glass of orange juice, please”. Obviously, he still hadn’t fully recovered from the crazy ride and didn’t really want to eat. The girl wrote the order down and glanced at the two related-looking men with curiosity. Finally, her gaze gravitated to the scientist.

“I’m sorry,” she smiled shily batting her eyelashes at him. “You wouldn’t happen to be Dr. Venture, the head of the VenTech company?” the girl twisted a lock from her ponytail around the finger flirtatiously. She looked quite cute and definitely was in a search for a sugar daddy. So, not a bad choice at all, especially for Rusty with his luck at getting laid. Well, at least she _would_ be if he had been actually interested. “I’ve recently read the New York Science Scene paper, and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen your photo in there,” the waitress chattered.

“Nah, sorry, I must look alike,” Dr. Venture smiled back, watching her getting stiff. Obviously, she had recognized Rusty and was sure it had been him – she just didn’t expect such a man to turn her down. Looking at her expression changing from a joyful to confused one was rather funny and, may I say, a bit pleasant. 

“What was that?..” the Monarch asked as soon as the waitress had moved to the other clients. “She was all over you!.. And I bet this doesn’t happen often”.

“It’d be cheaper and less dramatic to order a hooker,” the man smirked back, his gaze fixed at the corner behind their table. “Besides, Brock seemed to like her. So no fun for Rusty”.

The brand-new Venture turned around on his seat and followed the scientist’s eyes. Few seconds later he was looking back at Rusty with a long face “Hm, I must say, it doesn’t look like he wants to smash her. To eat alive or to fuck to death – may be”.

“Sure, he is a savage man,” Rusty agreed rolling his eyes. “But let’s not get out of the topic, okay? So”. He fixed the jacket and straightened up - it was the time to stand his ground. “First of all, I am a scientist, and I need my time to do science, comprende? I don’t want you clowns breaking into my house and ruining experiments. I want to know exactly when and where I will be attacked. You know, just like with Hatred – we used to have a schedule. Except I want you to actually follow it”. 

“What?!” the Monarch screamed agitated and immediately turned it down. “And what’s next? You’ll ask me to list the timeline of every henchman jerking off and taking a crap?”

“You have only one henchman, Malcom,” Rusty noted blankly, making emphasize on the last word.

“Wait, how did you call me?..” the villain clenched his fists and dared the other man to repeat.

Thankfully, the universe knew better than letting this conversation turn into to the most annoying family skirmish ever, so it took a pity on everyone around. A pity in the face of a very loud and hot gentleman. Literally hot, of course – screaming, he flew right through the restaurant’s window like a ragdoll, with his clothes partly on fire, and landed on the archnemesis’ table, sending it to the other side of the room.

The brothers looked at each other full of exasperation and almost instantly turned their heads back to the wrecked window at the noise – out from the street there was a car driving straight into them. With googled eyes both men dodged the vehicle in the last second, jumping on the either sides of the room.

At the very same instance Brock and Gary leapt up from their place and dashed to the car, a troop of armed people in colorful costumes getting out of it.

"I was having a family reunion here, assholes!" the Monarch yelled furiously and punched the nearest guy right in the guts. Obviously, the bodyguard didn’t hesitate to follow the villain’s lead in beating up intruders. He hosted other costume man over the head and threw him right into his confused companions. And so the fight had begun.

Rusty, as always, was the one to keep his head down in a situation like this – after all, staying away from injuries and possible encounter with Grim Reaper was the reason he had a bodyguard in the first place. Sure, he could probably knock one of the average henchmen down after practicing self-defense in Alaska, but he’d rather try to sneak out from the battlefield under the tables. And that’s exactly what he did, being as good a ninja as possible.

Fortunately, the Dodge Charger had been parked few meters away from the place and wasn’t damaged by the accident. So Rusty simply leaned on its side and started waiting patiently for the end of the beating (let’s be real, the costume guys didn’t have a chance). After about five more minutes of waiting the scientist was done with it and called the bodyguard. "Am I supposed to take a taxi or what?" he asked and raised an eyebrow, watching the blond man wiping blood off his face, the Monarch shaking some half-fainted dude on the background.

"I’ll be in a minute, Doc" the agent promised roughly and hung up.

And as the watches’ screen turned back to the main display, Rusty could only exhale deeply wondering how someone could possibly be that hot during a fight.

***

It was about twenty past two when Rusty and Brock returned to the Tower.

Right away the scientist announced that he had been fed up with all the OSI and Guild shenanigans for a day and went off to the lab. After all, the bar had been set pretty high at the morning meeting, and now the scientists had a lot of thinking to do. That’s why the rest of the day Rusty, Billy and Pete were trying to focus on actual work, brainstorming possibilities of improving the selected projects in between the usual chit-chat.

Hours had passed by fast, and it turned out that getting work done in Alaska had been significantly easier, even with the limitation of time. In Ney York there were annoying distractions like Billy finding old prototypes and playing with them or Pete hacking into deep web for fun and, of course, which was the most aggravating of all, intrusive and totally unreasonable splashes of unease or strange excitement. For some damn reason Rusty had been on pins and needles the whole evening and had been snapping at the colleagues constantly. It was only logical, that as the working day was over the dynamic duo insisted on going home.

"Hey, try not to wear yourself down, buddy” the shortest man advised while packing his stuff. “It won’t improve your braincells work and it definitely won’t help you to heal, trust me".

"Common wisdom," White agreed with a nod.

“Meh,” Rusty just shrugged them off. "I don’t want to fuck this gig up again. So… I’d better work for a bit longer. Maybe I’ll get some inspiration without your constant prattling around".

"Well, that’s your choice, I guess... We, on the other hand, are probably heading out then?" Master Quizboy semi-sked semi-told.

"Yeah, yeah, buzz off already," Dr. Venture waved his hand and the couple headed to the elevator.

"Do you think he’s serious?" Pete asked quietly, while waiting next to his life companion and watching the car’s doors opening.

“Ah, don’t worry, it will pass,” Billy whispered in return without the same concern and entered the elevator.

And with that Rusty had been left in the lab accompanied only by his sincere intention to buckle down. Actually, it had been working pretty well for about an hour and a half before the scientist decided to take a few minutes break, leaning on an elbow and supporting his head with a palm. Being wiped out by the cerebral and emotional fuckery of the day, he inevitably dropped off and slowly slid down on the table. And in this exact pose Brock had found him later that night - sleeping soundly on the workplace with the head resting on the keyboard, random nonsense printing on the screen.

“Jeez, Doc,” the bodyguard sighed and picked the scientist up softly, one arm under his leg and the other supporting the back. Rusty was in a such deep sleep that he didn’t event notice the motion – yeah, sometimes he definitely was a big baby, who needed extra care and discipline. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Fatal Attraction – a 1987 movie with the sexual scene in an elevator. Dan Gallagher is one of the main characters, who takes part in this scene.


	10. Passion rules the game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi, guys!  
> Important thing: you'll find asterisks (*) in the text (music related) - please, refer to the notes at the end!  
> The second asterisk is very important for the mood, so I suggest turn on this song when you encounter the second * right away.  
> P.S. I'm looking for BETA readers (Tumblr bloodyblow-blog). Also - I've changed my style of writing a bit in this chapter. Is it easier to read now?  
> P.S. P.S. thanks for waiting *^_^* The ending chapters take longer to write somehow!

“Come on, Brock! Are you even trying?” the scientist whined.

“I am!.. It’s just got stuck,” the bodyguard struggled to slide along the shaft.

Rusty wasn’t satisfied with the answer and stared at the man beside him “Well, don’t be so ginger than! I’m getting all wet up in here – you have to push harder”.

“Nah, it’s too tight,” Brock puffed. “Unless ya want me to tear it…”

“Oh, Lord, let me do it myself!” Dr. Venture grabbed the pole, taking matters into his own hands. “Here we go! Errr, huh… Yeah. You’re right, it won’t budge. We’d probably need some lube for that”.

The stupid umbrella was broken. Its runner got stuck, and there was no way to move it without breaking the cheap thing apart. Having no regrets, Dr. Venture tossed it into the trash and caught up with the bodyguard. The drizzle was getting stronger with every second.

“If I get sick, it will be your fault,” Rusty rubbed his upper arms to get warmer. He was grumbling at Brock, because the blond was the one to drag him out from the lab.

“Ya should’ve worn a coat,” said the agent, taking his brown jacket off.

“I should have kept on working,” Dr. Venture raised his hands up to grab Brock’s offering - at least, now he could partly cover from the rain, keeping the hoodless jacket right above the head. Thankfully, he didn’t need to worry about the wound getting wet as it had almost healed.

“Meh,” the scient hurried up to the car stomping the puddles. “That’s why I’ve always thought that romance movies are full of bullshit. Who in their right mind would like to make out in the downpour? Sticky clothes, cold water in your shoes, ick”.

Without a reply, Brock unlocked Adrienne’s doors and got inside, Rusty followed the example. The scientist didn’t feel much better in the cabin thought, except for the lack of rain – it was freezing. He sniffed, an unhappy expression across his face, and the bodyguard turned the heating system on.

Having learned from the past experience Dr. Venture buckled up right away and leaned back, listening to raindrops banging on the roof, relaxed by the pleasant sound of it. The car left the parking lot.

Habitually Brock stretched out his arm to pick one of the many cassettes he had and shoved it into the player. Rusty turned away from the side window distracted by the motion – and what was supposed to be just a glance grew into a straight up gaze.

The man on the driver seat looked damn good. Wet blond hair roughly pulled back with a strong hand, several locks still left on the forehead, soaked turtleneck tight enough to define all the right places – courteous thoughts seemed to abandon Rusty’s mind completely. He didn’t have a chance to snap out of it, when the bodyguard looked back at the man, quizzical. 

“All we had to do was to get delivery instead of going ourselves,” was the first thing that had come into scientist’s brains, and it made sense. Dr. Venture didn’t understand why Brock would volunteer to collect the order and draw him along. After all, it was just a black tie from Enzo. 

“Ya needed to crawl out from the fuckin’ basement, Doc,” the blond man replied. “And it’s Saturday. Ya never work on Saturdays”.

“Listen,” Rusty crossed his arms and stared at the obscured road in the side window. “I do appreciate your concern and all, but I am not a baby”.

“Don’t act as a baby then. Ya know you won’t hold on long to this… schedule. Cause it’s nuts. Find the balance or somethin’”.

Dr. Venture knew Brock was right. The scientist had already felt tired after challenging his brain power non-stop – he had nagging headache every other evening and probably took it out on the employees. At the same time Rusty didn’t want to risk - finally he had managed to achieve visible results at work only in one week. He was afraid that any major distraction from workflow would turn things back to the origins, to the times when the main pastime in the lab had been watching funny cats’ videos. The subject was a sore one for Dr. Venture, but Brock didn’t know it. He didn’t earn scientist’s bad attitude for been honest about his worries. And that was sweet of Brock to care. Not many people did give a crap about Rusty, after all.

“Hey, you should by happy, _honey_ ,” Dr. Venture broke the silence quirking an eyebrow. “I won’t work tomorrow. Well, at least, not in the strictest sense of the word”.

Sunday was the day when the charity ball was held, for which Rusty had ordered the classic black tie that was resting at the back seats. It was a significant event in the higher circle, so the scientist wouldn’t get away with wearing one of his colorful suits or his blue business one.

“Have you already rent a limo, Brock?”

“Sure,” said the blond man without a blink of an eye. “What was that ya were sayin’ ‘bout working?”

Rusty smirked and squinted at the driver – the scientist was a kind of person to never miss the opportunity, and the charity ball could potentially offer some. “Brock, this pompous event is not only the means to throw money away, but rather to find investors for VenTech’s projects”. The older man straightened up and fixed the jacket on his shoulders, his lips curving into complacent smile.

“I hope ya’re not plannin’ to suggest investin’ into somthin’ like a giant death ray, Doc”.

Rusty scoffed at the remark - he had his own standards. “What a super-scientist would I be If I asked to invest in things like a smart wallpaper, huh? Besides, dangerous and complicated stuff is more attractive – so if I won’t get an investor, I may get a one night stand, at least. Or both if I’m lucky enough”.

For Rusty mentioning his sexual life to Brock was more about reinforcing his own ideas. There was too much confusion brought by conflicting feelings the scientist had, so he decided he couldn’t go on like this anymore. His strategy to stop drooling at the bodyguard and come to senses was to simply move on to somebody else.

“Women aren’t interested in scientific nonsense, Doc”. 

“Some of them – may be,” Rusty agreed rolling his eyes. “And, you know what, I might as well explore my bisexuality and find a man. Men do like scientific nonsense”.

There was an awkward silence, and that didn’t go unnoticed by Rusty “Hey, I thought you were encouraging me being my true self”.

“Em, yeah, but this was kinda… unexpected,” the other man muttered. 

“It was, huh?” Rusty rubbed his hands timidly. “Well, if it weren’t for you, I would never accept this part of myself,” he smiled. “You know, you are a good friend, Brock”.

The agent quivered. A revelation hit him hard, harder that a kick in the balls. Despite all the attempts the man had made and all the hope he had found in last few days, Dr. Venture was still seeing him just as a friend. The super-asshole couldn’t detect any of Brock’s hints no matter how obvious they were. Sometimes the bodyguard just didn’t understand what was happening inside the scientist’s head. And all this bullshit led to the only conclusion – there was no other way to solve the problem but to be perfectly honest. 

***

Finally something interesting was happening in the Monarch’s life. 

The dressed-up man looked in the mirror with a hum and brushed his hair back. He wanted to look chic and slick to blend in. “Gary, do you think I need more pomade?” he asked the friend, who was ironing a black tuxedo in the same room.

The henchman raised his head up “No. Definitely not”.

“You could use some though,” the villain came closer, shaking a metal jar. He was in a good spirit, contrary to Gary, who pulled a face at this gesture and kept on smoothing the jacket.

“Come on, Gary, don’t sulk at me!” The Monarch placed his hand on the henchman’s shoulder and slightly pressed it. “Nothing bad will happen, I promise”.

“You’re not supposed to follow him around till he’s your official enemy. I don’t like it,” said Gary and set the iron on the board, front tip upwards. “Dude, what if the Guild knows?”

“Pff, we pulled off stunts much crazier than that! Besides, we’re only going to observe, study the arch’s natural habitats, go fuckin’ out! I’m already sick and tired of sitting at home, aren’t you?”

“I guess, I am,” the henchman sighed. 

***

“Is everyone ready?” Brock shouted from the lobby after checking the time. “We have to move out in five minutes.” He inwardly cursed the damn limo, which wasn’t designed for speed maneuvers and should be returned to the car hire agency without a scratch.

“Ready!” Hank strode across the hallway and leapt to the elevator doors; Dean followed right after him. Both young men were wearing black tuxedos and matching trousers, and the formal wear made them look nostalgically mature. The elevator had reached half of its way up from the first level, when Rusty rolled in the lobby with a jacket hanging over his arm. The man was struggling to adjust a bow tie, and the bow tie was winning. “Stupid thing,” he murmured and pulled the end, making the knot come undone. 

“Boys, hold the doors,” Brock moved to the scientist and took the black strip of cloth from the man’s hand to help him out. Time to time the easiest tasks made Rusty completely helpless. 

“Uhh, thanks,” the scientist looked down with a thin smile. There was something so adorable in his sudden awkwardness that Brock felt an urge to lay it on the line right here and there. But it was a bad time for this – Dr. Venture had already been agitated by the upcoming big event and didn’t need more stress. The agent placed the bow tie around Rusty’s neck and silently started working on it. When the adjustment was done Brock gently pushed the other man forward to the elevator, coming inside after him. The bodyguard hoped he would have a chance to confess his desires later, when the mood was right.

“Pop, do we really have to go with you? This charity thing must be lame,” Hank whined, tilting his head back.

“Yes, Hank, you’ve already agreed to this, remember,” said the unpleased father while putting on his tuxedo. “It’ll be good for our social image. Besides, it’s not just a charity, it’s a ball, which is drastically better, if you ask me”. 

“Oh, so there also will be young ladies?” the blond twin waggled his eyebrows and grinned.

“Yes, there will be ladies,” Rusty sighed. Hank’s excessive enthusiasm about women was killing him emotionally sometimes. The eldest son had certainly learned it from Brock. “But, for God’s sake, try to behave like proper adults, boys”.

The elevator stopped at the main level and its doors opened, letting the Venture family out. It hastily marched through the Tower’s hall and hit the gloomy streets of New York. A black rented limousine had been waiting at the entrance.

“I don’t understand it,” Dean wondered getting on the back seats with his brother, “why don’t we use the jet?” 

“Because if we show off too much, we’ll have to donate more, boys,” said Rusty and buckled up.

Brock still had been outside, checking on the limo’s trunk and its overall state – you never knew what an enemy could came up with. But everything seemed to be fine, so the man took his place in the front and started up the engine.

“Belts?” he asked briefly, moving the car’s seat further away from the dashboard.

“Done,” Rusty confirmed and Hank shouted from the back “Nah, no seat belts! But there is champagne instead!”

“Hank,” Dr. Venture scowled at the son, “give me that. I’m serious, young man, handle the bottle over”. With a disappointed “aww” Hank followed the order and holed up in the corner stewing.

“Great. Now, just hold on to something, all right?” the scientist advised. Dean clenched to a side handle, and the car moved.

Now Rusty could breathe easier – nothing was up to him anymore. If they got late it would be the fault of traffic, not his, so there was no point in worrying, he’d rather relax and try to enjoy the ride.

“Is it Def Leppard?” the scientist asked after switching his focus on the playing song *****. “Didn’t know you were a fan”.

“It’s fine,” Brock shrugged with his classical “whatsoever” face. “Cd’s been already in”.

“I see,” Rusty drawled and leaned on the side of the door with his elbow, fist pressing on the temple. He was more of a progressive rock type, but at least the playing band was something different from Brock’s beloved Led Zeppelin, that Dr. Venture had heard millions of times. The scientist listened to the lyrics closely and chuckled – the song was literally about the bodyguard, a self-assured male over whom women went crazy. Uninvited images popped up in Rusty’s mind making him envy those women, but the scientist restrained himself from fostering it – he had already been in too deep with all that butterflies-in-his-stomach crap. Seeking means to get distracted, the man took out his phone and tapped on the email icon, when the next song started. The electric guitar into couldn’t be mixed up with anything else – Dr. Venture was about to test his self-control again.

_Let's spend the night together I know you want it too_

_The magic of the moment Is what I've got for you_

_The heartbeat of this night Is made to lose control_

_And there is something in your eyes That's longing for some more_

The scientist winced and gave the driver his side-eye. Not noticing anything suspicious in Brock’s behavior, Rusty concluded the repetitive music theme was a coincidence, so he got back to his phone and tried to ignore the soul-wrecking lyrics. He opened a new mail from the Pirate - it was another report on the company performance numbers. Having nothing else to do, Dr. Venture started reading it, but when the man hit the middle, he caught on to miss the point completely and had to re-read the thing over again. However, he still hadn’t finished with the mail when another fascinating song came up – the look on Brock’s face suggested that now he had felt weird about this too.

Hank, on the other hand, found the situation amusing and moved closer to the front seats banding forward "Didn’t know you had a pick-up cd, Brock!"

"I don’t!" said the bodyguard and faced the young man, making Rusty bug out his eyes at a truck they were driving into. "And if I had one, I wouldn’t play it to ya," the driver promised and spun the steering wheel to dodge the other car, Hank being thrown at the back. The Venture family was in the safety again, although the scientist had still been clenching the door’s handle, not fully recovered from shock.

The bodyguard furrowed and reached his hand to the player - he could agree with Hank on the fact that the mixtape didn’t exactly suit the family ride. The current playing song was especially touching for the man, which didn’t make it easier to stay put together. He pushed the pause button and pressed “eject”. Nothing happened.

"What the F," Brock swore and tried to switch on the radio. Unfortunately, it didn’t work either. Next he tried the volume handle, but it simply fell off.

“That seems like a bad prank,” Rusty said after watching the taller man struggle. “Well. They could be sure that I’ll ask for a discount”. He folded his arms and pouted – the family had a long ride ahead, a ride full of songs about love, lust and longing.

***

It took them about an hour and a half to make it to the destination. The limo was parked at a lot next to the opened gates, and everyone got outside to proceed further to a huge old mansion. A short line to the security staff, that was standing in front of the main entrance, had already formed, and the Venture family took its place in the queue. While waiting to be checked in the guest list, the scientist couldn’t resist to give his sons a brief lecture about the importance of the event again, and his speech finished just in time for them to come over to the security.

“Dr. Thaddeus Venture,” Rusty announced. The guard’s eyes jumped from the one family member to another and finally stopped on the blond, glaring at the butch man. The scientist sighed "I’m Dr. Venture. Those are my sons – Dean and Hank Venture. And this is my man Brock Samson. He's my bo..."

"Okay, Mr. Venture,” the guard interrupted. “Your table’s number twelve. Your family and the plus one could move on to the hall".

Rusty grimaced but did as he’d been told to, followed by Brock and his offspring. "Fuff, what an ignorant ass," he muttered to the taller man while entering the mansion. "Did you hear that, Brock? _Mister_ Venture. Like I’m some kind of a procrastinating rich parasite, and not a super-scientist".

“Really? Ya aren’t concerned by the plus one thing, Doc?” the other man raised a brow. 

“Pff, I’m already used to this,” Rusty waved off and entered the main chamber. “I mean, we probably look like an old married couple to everybody”.

The ballroom was huge. It could possibly accommodate more than a thousand of men, but at the time it was almost empty – people had just begun to arrive. Round white-cloth tables were set up around the room with an empty space for dancing in front of the stage, that was opposite to the entrance. The table number twelve appeared to be closer to the middle of the ballroom, and that was where the Ventures headed to, so they could wait for the opening speech.

An unpleasant surprise was welcoming Rusty at the table, occupying a seat. “What on earth are you doing here?” the scientist asked while taking his place between the sons and the bodyguard. 

“I’m doing my job,” said Shore Leave and threw his hand in the air with usual sass. He leaned closer, over Brock’s silverware, to keep his talk quiet. “The OSI is always watching. Especially at blowouts like this”.

“Two agents at the same table, that’s overkill,” the bodyguard, who was on the right hand of Shore Leave, crossed his arms. He wasn’t happy with his agent-buddy being stuck to him like a limpet all evening long, because he had another intentions and needs, which didn’t include Shore Leave with his over-the-top reactions whatsoever.

“It wasn’t me who made a seating chart,” the moustache man shrugged. He raised a glass of champagne with a smirk “I believe, it must be fate”. 

More and more people were entering the ballroom with every minute, and when all the seats were taken, the opening part began. The host briefly informed about the event’s history and purposes and moved on to the main part. With extra flattering he described his gratitude to the participants and made special mention of those who had contributed the most. After that the speech had been over and the stage was occupied by musicians. People started getting up from their places, ready to socialize - it was the time for the crème de la crème to make new acquaintances or to strengthen old connections.

“All right, boys,” Dr. Venture looked away from the stage. “I’m going to present myself to some big shot over there. You can hang somewhere around, just try not to mess things up, okay?”

“Wait, pop,” Dean tugged the scientist on his sleeve. “How long do we have to stay here? My chemical classes have been rescheduled for tomorrow morning, and… I don’t want to stay out late”.

“It’s hard to say, Dean. Usually these events take a while. But you know what – you don’t have to spend the whole evening here. It’s enough for you to show up at least, so go on and order a taxi whenever you need to”.

“Hey,” Hank came from behind and popped his head between two talking men. “Does that mean that I can leave too if I want?”

The scientist sighed “Yes, Hank. But only if you leave with your brother, you get it?”

“Okey dokey,” the blond twin agreed. “Hey, can you give us some cash for a taxi, pop? I haven’t got paid yet”.

Rusty opened his mouth and was ready to scold the son for being wasteful with his pocket money, but Dean was ahead of him to say “Actually, I think to ask Jared for a lift.” The young man rubbed his palms on thigs nervously “He happens to work in a restaurant nearby, so… Well, he probably can pick us up after his shift ends”. 

“All right, that would be fine,” Dr. Venture nodded. He was glad the issue had been settled, he needed to do business.

The ballroom was full of rich and influential people from all around the world. Some of them were well-known celebrities, some of them were politicians, and some – businessmen. Rusty hadn’t been in this environment for long enough to know all the secret moves and magic phrases, but he had a good idea how to put on his best phony mask of overconfidence. Methodologically he began to pass from one group of chatting billionaires to another, introducing himself with courtesy and participating in small talk. Occasionally he tried to flirt, but the most important part of the whole thing was to bring up VenTech’s promising projects, what the scientist did when the moment seemed to be right. 

At the same time Brock was chilling away from the crowd, a glass of whiskey in his hand. He didn’t feel like hitting on dressed up women for obvious reason, and, especially, he didn’t want to contact with any of these rich snobs. The man found it more riveting to observe the ballroom from his vantage point – wealthy people, staff, undercover agents, Hank and Dean, but more importantly – Rusty chirping with the others.

“Hey, Romeo,” Shore Leave leaned on the wall next to the bodyguard, drawing the man’s attention. “You haven’t picked up any chick yet. That’s something new”. Brock only shrugged at the notice – he wasn’t in the mood to explain himself.

“Gah, I’m done with watching!” the moustache man threw his hand in the air dismissively. “We both know it’s nothing but a precaution. Villains aren’t that dumb. Let the field agents do the boring job, and I’m gonna have fun”.

“What, ya wanna hook up with an English lord or somethin’?”

“Oh, please! I want to have _fun_ , not a tea party,” Shore Leave rolled his eyes. “Although…You may have a point,” the man rubbed his chin. “I can challenge myself to seduce, liberate and pervert a conservative just for kicks. Well done, Samson, I actually like that idea!”

Brock folded his arms “Yeah, right”.

“It will be a piece of cake. One dance – and bam! The guy’s in my clutches,” the sassy man smirked and fixed his hat. “No man can resist my charms. And my hotness”.

“Okay,” said Brock, squinting with displeasure. “Why won’t ya go on and execute your plan, huh?”

“Boy oh boy,” Shore Leave mumbled and pulled away from the wall. “I think, I’ve found my victim. Wish me luck, macho man!” He winked at the bodyguard and, with a sway of hips, pranced to the group of schmoozing people not far away from the dance floor. The agent was beaming a gallant smile when he addressed an unsuspecting victim – indeed, Shore Leave could act pretty charming when he wanted to. He offered his hand with a little bow, signature cockiness in all his moves and a face of a man who was used to get what he wanted. The person, that had been chosen by the agent, gave in and reached out his hand only to be gripped and drawn out next to the stage by Shore Leave. A glass cracked in Brock’s hands. It was Dr. Venture.

***

“Why are you doing this?” Rusty curled his lip. The other man only smiled and kept on waltzing around slowly. “My agreement is just a matter of courtesy, if you what to know,” the scientist said to his dance partner.

“Oh, I _do_ know,” Shore Leave promised. “I do know that someone else has been on your mind lately”.

Dr. Venture could almost feel a needle stabbing into his chest, but he didn’t give it away. Instead, he followed the other man’s lead obediently like nothing had happened, turning under his raised arm.

“Actually, this person is on my mind too,” said the agent.

Rusty could only guess what game Shore Leave was playing, but the scientist didn’t plan to lose to him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he stared back at the taller man waiting for the explanation. There was no chance that the agent had got into Dr. Venture’s brains and sniffed out his secret.

“Oh, everything’s pretty simple, sweety,” the lead leaned to Rusty closer than the waltz implied. “Brock Samson,” he whispered with a self-satisfied smile, looking forward to Dr. Venture’s reaction. But the man was better than that - he had been practicing hiding feelings for many years, so it wasn’t that hard for him to restrain the visual composure. Shore Leave wasn’t the one to back down as well “He’s literally crazy about you. And that’s a fact”.

“ _You_ are crazy,” said Rusty stunned by the ridiculous remark. He hadn’t seen this one coming. “Brock is straighter than an arrow, and _that_ is definitely a fact”.

“Do you know, what is the surest sign of men’s passion, Dr. Venture?” Shore Leaved ignored the scientist’s argument. “Jealousy. Some may say it’s like a cancer – girl, please! I call it the cause of relationship progress”.

Rusty frowned at the man’s reasoning - it seemed like the agent was living in a weird little world of his own. The scientist simply couldn’t comprehend what Shore Leave was talking about or what he was after, and that was bothersome. “So, what’s that got to do with anything? I’m not really interested in your life position,” said Dr. Venture.

“Woo wee, we’ve got a difficult case here! Now, reck those delusional brains of yours,” the agent squeezed Rusty’s hand harder, “and try to remember how your oh-look-I’m-so-straight bodyguard has made a scene in Alaska. Jeez, I’ve never seen him that jelly before”.

“That wasn’t jealousy,” Dr. Venture protested and felt that his face was starting to blush - after all, Shore Leave’s obtrusive confidence had managed to prompt some doubts in Rusty’s heart. 

“Oh, whatever you say, girlfriend,” the lead cooed and pulled Dr. Venture even closer. Leisurely the agent’s hand slid from the other man’s back down to his bottom. The move was so shocking for Rusty, that he forgot to do something about it and was simply staring at Shore Leave full of embarrassment, and who knew what the bold man would do next if it weren’t for the sudden grip on his shoulder.

A sigh of relief escaped Dr. Venture’s mouth – his honor had been saved from the following disgrace, and the knight in shining armor was the bodyguard. The man had probably noticed unease on Rusty’s face and decided to step in as a good friend would. Rusty fixed his tuxedo and got excited to watch Brock go all protective about him and aggressive to the other agent, but the blond didn’t meet these expectations. “May I cut in,” he said instead and, surly, it wasn’t much of a question.

With no hesitation Shore Leave got his hands away from the scientist and stepped aside “Oh, you’re such a downer, we were having so much fun”. ***** He moved behind Brock’s back, shot the last glance at Rusty and winked. The scientist had never been so puzzled and disoriented in his life, so yet again he didn’t know what to do next. But Brock did.

He took Rusty’s hand in his own with admirable determination and placed the right arm around the man’s waist. Bodyguard’s assertiveness didn’t leave any chance for Dr. Venture to protest - the scientist blindly followed Brock’s body signals replying to the pressure by moving accordingly. Unfolding Una Cabeza and the figures they were using suggested only one thing – and yet Rusty couldn’t fully believe it. Confused and nervous, he lifted his head up “Are you… tangoing me?”

The piano chords came on strong. With a sensual motion Brock pushed Rusty away holding his hand and sharply pulled back into the firm grip. “Don’t mind if I do,” he whispered and stood still, his passionate eyes fixed on the flustered partner. Dr. Venture swallowed and the bodyguard moved again, his steps smooth and accurate, his body language so easy to read.

Even in a wildest dream Dr. Venture had never imagined something quite like this. His whole body was full of thrilling tingles, intoxicated by Brock’s touch, his smell, his gaze, his everything. And if Rusty could, he would do anything to make the moment last forever. He felt so much, and he understood so little while they kept on dancing in a feverish harmony like they were one.

The man still felt dizzy, when Brock caught both of his hands and turned him around swiftly in a cuddle position, squeezing tight against Rusty. The blond bent over just above the scientist’s ear to whisper “When I saw Shore Leave getting all handsy with you, I was barely holding on”. The scientist shivered.

“Now ya tell me, would a friend do somethin’ like this?” With a sharp motion, Brock turned the scientist around and dipped him low. Rusty gasped, his muscle tense in the unusual position. Yet, he had completely forgotten about that, when his partner started leaning down closer, like a cobra ready to attack, his lips slightly parted. Breathless, Rusty petrified, his body trembling and his eyes fixed on that desired mouth...

“Gosh, they are finally kissing!” someone exclaimed from the side, and frustrated dancers tilted their heads towards the sassy voice. “Come on, I’ve been waiting for this moment forever, damn it!”

Of course, of-fucking-course! Finally, it struck Rusty. How could he be so blind? Shore Leave had been making bets on him since the very Alaska! He had made the OSI detain Dr. Venture in the Northern Hell and had set up the brawl with Connor, he had stopped the elevator, had probably recorded that weird mix cd, and, after all, he had cunningly made Rusty dance with Brock. And Brock… Well, he had been a part of this all along. 

“What?..” the sassy man placed his hand on the hip. “Am I too early?”

“Oh, no, you are just in time,” Dr. Venture broke free from the bodyguard’s hands. The scientist felt humiliated – he had let his guard down to the person he loved and what had Rusty got in return? A slap in the face. It was almost funny to realize, that he had been a second away from letting his feelings prevail and falling for the act. “Now I’m perfectly aware of you both ganging up on me,” Rusty pointed a finger at the other men with a hiss. He didn’t scream out loud just because he knew it wasn’t the right place.

“Why did you have to make your stupid bets on me, huh? What did I do to deserve being made a fool of again?” Dr. Venture gesticulated violently, full of bile. “You know what. I’m not so socked by _your_ shenanigans,” he glared at Shore Leave, who raised his palms up to show peaceful intentions. “But, Brock, you… _You_ are a real letdown,” Rusty breathed out and stared at the blond man, feeling that his heroically controlled rage was about to degrade into a fit of hysteria.

“Listen, it’s not like that,” the bodyguard promised coming closer and tried to seize Rusty’s hand, but the pained man ducked the move.

“Stop it,” he said in a broken voice. “I don’t wanna hear anything, I don’t wanna see anyone, and hell I don’t wanna speak with you, Judases, any time soon,” Dr. Venture summed up and sharply turned away. He felt like shit. He looked like a mess. But he was strong enough to fix himself - all he needed was a little time alone. And may be a glass of champagne. Or two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * Music list for the ride:  
> Def leppard - Make Love Like A Man  
> Scorpions - Rhythm of Love  
> Rainbow - I Surrender  
> Kiss - I stole your love  
> Def Leppard - Pour Some Sugar On Me  
> Buckcherry - Lonely  
> Loverboy - Lovin' Every Minute Of It  
> Bad Company - I Can't Live Without You  
> Van Halen - I can't stop loving you  
> Kiss - Heaven's On Fire  
> Rascal Flatts - Life is a Highway  
> The police - every breath you take  
> Foreigner - Say You Will  
> Queen - Tear It Up  
> Scorpions - No One Like You  
> Kiss - Uh! All Night  
> Europ - I'll Cry For You  
> Slade - A Night To Remember  
> Buckcherry - Next To You  
> Alice Cooper - Feed My Frankenstein  
> Whitesnake - Still of the night  
> The Darkness - I Believe In a Thing Called Love  
> Nazareth - Love Hurts  
> Foreigner - Hot Blooded  
> Bon Jovi - In These Arms  
> Foghat - I just want to make love to you (live version)  
> Jace Everett - I wanna do bad things with you 
> 
> * Please, find this video on youtube "Nicola Benedetti: Por Una Cabeza, from Scent of a Woman" and turn on the song while reading further! You won't regret, I promise!  
> If you want to see the mood of the moves, pls search for "The Tango - Scent of a Woman (4/8) Movie CLIP (1992) HD" on youtube


	11. All in good time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi, everyone <3!  
> That is the final chapter! I hope, you'll like it ^_^  
> I'm still looking for beta readers (Tumblr bloodyblow-blog), and this work's still under construction (aka it's structure/style can be changed in the future, but not the plot).  
> Warning: graphical mature content.  
> P.S.: please, use condoms!  
> Bonus: I'm planning to order some art for the fic. It'll probably be on my Tumblr

“You were right, Gary,” the Monarch snatched a canape from a passing by waiter and put it in his mouth. “This party is fucking lame! I’m even more bored than I was at home watching Honey Boo Boo”. 

“Dude, I wouldn’t be so sure about that…”

“We’ve been here for two hours already and nothing interesting’s happened,” the redhaired man folded his arms. “Dr. Venture didn’t embarrass himself, Hank and Dean didn’t do anything stupid and there are OSI agents everywhere so we can’t even prank those snobbish assholes! Let’s get the hell out of here”.

“Ahem, do you really want to miss Dr. Venture doing tango?” Gary pointed to the dancefloor with a node, and the villain turned around to observe the picture, his brows slowly raising up. The Monarch had been expecting to witness Rusty leading a desperate-for-any- attention woman, but surly not _this._

“You must be kidding me,” he grinned and got out the phone. “Sheesh, it’s time to update my vlog channel,” the villain pressed record and moved forward to get a better view, Gary following shortly.

The henchman’s eyes were particularly fixed on Brock, watching his every move. At some point of Gary’s life the agent had been a person to look up to, and at some point he had become a worthy rival. “I can’t believe he’s also great at tango!.. It’s like the man’s perfect at fucking everything”.

“Pfft, I bet he can’t handle a sewing machine as well as you do,” the Monarch brushed it off, keeping his attention to the screen. “Wait, what’s going on? Are they arguing? I can’t hear a thing,” intrigued, he made a step toward the scene, but Gary stretched out his arm before the other man’s chest. “Hey, remember, we must stay low,” the henchman frowned.

“Meh,” The Monarch straightened up and stopped the recording. “Mister Sailor ruined the moment. Still, good enough for posting”. He stared at the phone, head down, and tried to remember the password to his channel’s account.

“Ahhh, dude,” Gary tapped at the other man’s upper arm and backed up slowly. “Venture’s heading our way”.

“What?!” The Monarch raised his chin up to see the fuming scientist striding across the dance floor. “Go, go, go,” the villain shoved his phone in the pocket, agitation on his face, and pushed the henchman back, into people, moving as far as possible from the coming arch. The taller man wasn’t even looking where they were going, keeping his eyes on Dr. Venture the whole time.

“Dude!” he bumped into something warm and firm, which appeared to be Gary. “There’s a wall! And it doesn’t lead to the Platform 9 ¾, stop pushing”.

“Shit, he’s going our way!” panicking, the Monarch grabbed the other man’s jacket and shook him. “We can’t let him see us, Gary! He’ll rat us out to Dr. My Wife, and she’ll fucking kill me!..”

“Shh-shh, dude, don’t freak out,” the henchman grasped the villain’s face, lightly pressing his cheeks, so the other man had to bend much closer. “He won’t notice us - we look like some snogging couple”.

“Nonsense,” the Monarch muttered as they both froze looking at each other.

With his peripheral vision the taller man could see Dr. Venture running out of the door, which appeared to be a yard away. Rusty had left, and the Monarch sighed full of relive. He got more upright and leaned on the wall with one arm. “Phew! That was close,” hi smirked. “Hey, did you see his pathetic sore face? I wonder what’s happened out there”.

“Ummm, dude,” Gary coughed apologetically. “I don’t really wanna to upset you, but Brock’s coming here too”.

“Argh, that sucks! Can we hide somewhere?..” the redhaired man was turning his head around like an owl. He wanted to eliminate any possibility of getting caught by the bodyguard, who was much more observant than Dr. Venture and twice as ruthless. The previous time Brock had been in a bad mood, he’d punched the Monarch so hard that the villain’s jaw had got dislocated. And the Monarch hated visiting his doctor. 

“Nah,” Gary doubted the assumption. “Let’s stick to the previous plan. It worked once, right?”

“Okay. Right. Making out,” the taller man clutched Gary’s shoulders and pulled, smashing into his mouth. Brock rushed into the door past them, not paying any attention, and the villain topped off the kiss.

“What was that?” the henchman wiped his lips, confusion on his face mixed with irritation.

The Monarch shrugged. There wasn’t a logical reason for what he’d done, he’d simply felt like it. “I tried to be more convincing, I guess”.

“Dude! Was it necessary to use your tongue though?” Gary crossed his arms pouting.

“Ha! Don’t tell me you didn’t like it,” the taller man teased and slapped his friend. “Anyway! We’re done here, it’s time to move out”. 

“Well, well, well!” someone exclaimed from behind, and the Monarch turned around making a face. “What are you, two lovebirds, doing here, hm?” Shore Leave placed his fists on the hips, raising a tweezed eyebrow. 

***

A deep breath in. A deep breath out.

Not having enough air, Rusty slacked off trotting, a sad smirk spread across his face. He was acting pathetic - having a breakdown like that and running around thoughtless, while the wise decision would be to get hold of himself and deliberate.

The man uttered a grunt and looked over the place. After non-stop dashing about the park he’d ended up in a center part of a maze, a quaint fountain standing in its heart. Dr. Venture dragged himself to the basin, took off the glasses and, not having a second thought, dunked his face into the chill water. Common sense was returning to him slowly, helping the man reevaluate the reality. 

The whole dance situation didn’t seem as disastrous anymore – of course, Rusty had been hurt, but only because he’d winded himself up. The agents didn’t have a clue about his feeling for Brock, and clearly, they’d only intended to make a stupid joke, not to harass Dr. Venture. The scientist sighed and slumped to the ground, leaning on a hedgerow. He didn’t even think about his fancy pants getting dirty.

It was a turning point. Rusty couldn’t lie to himself anymore. After the hurricane of emotions he’d experienced that evening, there was no way he could denying the obvious - he loved the other man. He’d been in love with Brock for many years, and he could never change it. As well as he couldn’t change being far out of the bodyguard’s league. Because Rusty was a man. Period. His love and his desires were unrequited. He had to be strong and accept it and learn to live with it.

Tiredly, Dr. Venture tilted his head back, resting it against the greenery wall. The man scoffed – he despised himself for bearing even the smallest crumb of hope for getting a happy ending in this love story. He’d been imagining things that weren’t real which had led to him acting like a fool and a hysteric. The only graceful way to get out of this mess was to pretend being fine and to avoid further discussions on the subject. At least, that was the plan.

“Are ya still mad?” Rusty turned to the voice and saw the bodyguard coming out from a maze’s passage.

“Nah,” the scientist shrugged wearing the best face of indifference he had. “I overreacted. You know, all this money problems and overworking could get anyone a bit psycho”.

The taller man hummed walking over and sat beside the scientist on the grass. He didn’t speak right away, but rather took his time to think over something disturbing, deep wrinkles between his eyebrows. “Listen, Doc, I need to talk to ya”.

“I know, I know,” Dr. Venture rolled his eyes. “You’re sorry, I accept your apologies, blah blah blah. Not a big deal, the case is closed”.

“Doc, can ya just listen for a sec?” the man put his hand on Rusty’s shoulder, and the latter flinched out of surprise. “There’s nothing for me to be sorry ‘bout, okay? I’d never _gang up_ with Shore Leave to mess with your feelings. And I’ve no idea ‘bout his bets. For all I know he could be playin’ a fuckin’ Gay Fairy godmother or something!”

“That’s rich, Brock,” Dr. Venture furrowed and threw the man’s hand off him. “Do you understand, you’re practically saying that you wanted to dance me around, huh? Doesn’t seem much plausible to me,” he squinted, crossing his arms. “So, will you grow up and admit your guilt like an adult? I’ve already forgiven you anyway”.

“Jeez,” Brock rubbed his eyes. ”I danced with ya ‘casue I wanted to, simple as that. Stop makin’ things up”.

Rusty sat still, hovering uncomfortably over the idea. He couldn’t grasp why would Brock lie about something like that, let alone actually do something like that. 

“Ahhh, I see,” the man finally chuckled, clinging to his previous believes. “You think I’m a baby. So. You decided to save me from your horny coagent, right? Like an overprotective friend that you are”.

“Wait, what?..” the bodyguard frowned. “No, no, no and fuckin’ no! I did it ‘cause I wanted you to myself, ‘cause I’m fuckin’ into ya!” he snapped at Rusty and exhaled heavily. He’d never meant to raise his voice like that or to be rude and aggressive, but he couldn’t help it – there was too many thoughts on his mind and too many worries in his heart. “Listen, Rusty, I’m sorry I kind of lost it. I just wanted you to get this - I really like ya. Remember I had a guy crush at the university?.. Well, he was you”.

“Oh, come on now!” the scientist got out from the stupor. “That can’t be the truth. We saw each other only twice, and the first time we met you gave me a glass jaw - doesn’t really seem like a sight of affection to me, duh”.

“Yeah, if I did pot as much as you, I wouldn’t remember shit either,” Brock shrugged. “Our real first time was at Captain Shark. I came there once, I saw ya and after that I kept on going to this shithole just to watch ya. Like a fuckin’ creep,” the bodyguard scoffed. “I didn’t understand why I was doin’ it though. Just couldn’t stop thinking ‘bout you. As I said, I always stayed away. But one day ya had to get in a jam, and I had to cut in. And for that help, well… you thanked me with a blowjob”.

“All right. That one does sound believable,” Rusty agreed, disconcerted – his weird dream’s puzzle had strangely started to get together. “But, obviously, you thought it was a college mistake, right? That’s why you decided to beat me up after all”.

“Not exactly,” Brock rubbed his neck. “Sure, ya fucked my brains up pretty bad causing all this sexuality questioning crap, but, uhh… it wasn’t the main reason. I mean, I got expelled the very next day. So I got drunk and took my problems out on ya geeks”.

“Aha, so I partly got it right,” Rusty thought out loud following the train of the bodyguard’s story. “You battered us because you had a bad day. Yet, meeting me at the bar had been a mistake”.

“Jesus, why is it so hard,” Brock grunted. He wasn’t used to share his feelings, and he didn’t know how to put his heart’s reasoning into words so it wouldn’t sound stupid. But at least he had to try. “A mistake, ya say… Well, I wanted it to be. Made myself believe I didn’t like the experience. Tried to get ya out of my head. And, trust me, it was a pain in the ass, so I hung on to the USM and the OSI, got myself busy, didn’t leave any place for overthinking. I almost blocked ya out from my mind, and the next thing I knew – they appointed me to a bodyguard work. For you”.

“Umm,” Rusty knitted his eyebrows. “So, do I need to apologize for your psychological trauma or what?..”

“Nothin’ of this is your fault. It’s me who was fuckin’ blind and couldn’t embrace the truth. There were so many situations when I could figure it out, but no, I was a stubborn asshole! Remember those times when I quitted the job and was hiding from the OSI? Damn, I was missing the family so bad I became a total wreck. Ya should’ve seen me than,” the man snickered Flashing back to his overweight problems. “And, Doc, when ya showed up at the S.P.H.I.N.X base, I was over the moon, and yet I couldn’t face the fact I had feeling for you. I was an idiot. And where did it get me? A man in his forties, jerking off at the thought of his fuckin’ friend”.

Rusty swallowed. He felt like he was lost in a parallel universe, where everything was upside down. “So, are you actually implying you’ve been into me since the college and that you are… sexually attracted to me or am I going crazy?” the scientist smiled full of awkwardness, still afraid to believe.

“Great, you finally got it,” the bodyguard raised his head up and glanced at Rusty – the man looked unusually pale. “Listen, Doc, ya don’t have to return my feelings… It’s fine if you’d like to pretend this conversation’s never happened”. 

Dr. Venture quivered, a nervous chuckle escaping his mouth “That is. Complete. Infinite. Bullshit”. It seemed like the epiphany of Rusty’s life – Brock being interested in him and, moreover, Brock falling for him first. It was ridiculous. The scientist giggled - if he hadn’t been such a chicken, they would’ve already been a couple. Or at least an ex-couple. But instead of that they’d been pining for each other for all these years. Such surreal thoughts made the scientist loose it – he was completely shocked and utterly happy at the same time, twitching with laughter and whines like a nutcase. 

“Brock, get back,” he tugged on the other man’s sleeve head, when the bodyguard tried to stand up. “I’m not laughing at you. I’m just having hysterics, that’s… ah, that’s a psychological reaction to stress,” he smiled.

“Okay, so what’s your answer then?” Brock furrowed. “Am I friendzoned or not?”

Rusty leaned on the agent’s shoulder and smirked. Finally, he could feel the power of control over the other man and he was loving it. “Well, you are a very dear friend of mine Brock, aren’t ya?” he teased, and the bodyguard flinched like he was about to leave again.

“Nuh-uh, you’re not going anywhere, Brock. Because I haven’t given you my answer yet,” Dr. Venture stretched out and cupped the other’s man face, pulling the caught off-guard blond into a luscious kiss. He pressed to Brock’s broad chest lightly and glided his tongue between the man’s supple lips, expressing all the longing he had been keeping down, making up for the lost time. A star was exploding into a supernova and dragging them into a black hole, as they were savoring each other.

The bodyguard groaned with arousal and knocked Rusty down to the grass, his big hands shamelessly wandering around the responsive body. And when Brock got his palm on the scientist’s stomach and started sliding it down, Rusty realized what they were doing and where they were doing it, and as much as he desired the other man, he couldn’t let it happen that way. Knowing his bodyguard all too well, Dr. Venture snapped the jaw and pulled away, taste of iron on his tongue. “That’s your answer,” he smiled watching Brock grin and wipe a trickle of blood off his lip. “But don’t even think to take me _here_. I’m too old for this crap – I need four walls, a roof and a bed. Just find us a comfy love nest, and you can bang me however you like”.

Brock growled like a mad dog, his trousers tenting over a notable boner. “To the hotel,” he took Rusty’s hand and jumped up, so the other man had to stand on his feet next. Without asking, the bodyguard threw protesting Rusty over his shoulder like a hunting prey and moved out of the maze, the look of complete satisfaction with such a wonderful capture was written all over his face. 

***

“Hey, Deano,” Hank flopped on the chair next to the brother, who was typing on his phone. “Will Jared be here anytime soon?”

The younger twin looked up “Oh, yes, he said he’ll be in ten minutes. Why? I thought you were trying to impress that girl… ahm, Amanda, right?”

“Hank doesn’t need to _try_ to get lady’s attention. She fell for me right off the bat,” the blond put his hands around the head and winked. “Well, I’d gladly stay here with Mandy and let you have some lovey-dovey time with Jared privately, if she didn’t have to leave”.

“Don’t say things like that so loud, Hank” the redhead whispered blushing. “What if… somebody hears”.

“So what?” Hank dropped his arms and bent closer to the brother. “Come on, Dean! There’s nothing wrong ‘bout it. When are you gonna tell pop and Brock? I can’t believe Uncle Hatred got to know before them”.

“It’s not that easy,” Dean scratched his palm nervously. “You do understand that pop expects me to be a model son, right? And being bi… bisexual doesn’t really describe that concept,” he fetched a sigh, and Hank placed his hand on the brother’s shoulder. “And Brock… well, he kind of hates Jared for no reason”.

“He doesn’t hate him, Dean. He’s just worried ‘bout you, because that what family does,” Hank smiled reassuringly, a warm glint in his eyes. “We are the Ventures, Dean, remember? We stick together no matter what. I’m sure they’ll get over it”.

“Ah, thanks, Hank. Maybe you’re right,” the younger twin smiled back sadly. He didn’t know how he would cope with his anxiety had it not been for the support of the brother. 

The phone in Dean’s hand beeped, notifying about an incoming message, and the redhead hurried to read it. “Jared’s waiting outside the gates. I guess, I’ll call pop to say we’re leaving,” Dean lifted his arm to make a watch-call when a strong hand presumptuously grabbed his wrist. 

“No-no-no, bad idea,” Shore Leave shook his finger and released the other man’s limb. “Your dads are having an adult conversation. Better not to disturb them”.

Dean jumped up from the seat frowning with worry “Did pop pull something weird again?”

“Er, we’d have noticed that,” Hank shrugged. “They’re probably fighting over minor stuff like always”.

“Exactly! That one,” Shore Leave nodded and leaned on one leg. “And believe me, you don’t want to be in the middle of their yadayada, sweeties”. 

“Yeah, I think he has a point,” Hank got himself up and stretched. “’sides, we aren’t babies anymore and pop’s already said we could go whenever”.

***

Rusty left the car, slamming the door behind him. The imposing building they had driven to suggested that a one-night stay wouldn’t be cheap, but at least it wasn’t a rotten motel. Remembering the reason of being in the place made the man breath out full of excitement and nervousness, he braced himself and followed Brock to the entrance. Luckily, Dr. Venture had one less problem to worry about – he’d planned to hook up with somebody at the ball, whether it would be a man or a woman, and now he was physically prepared for the action.

The hotel’s lobby was unsurprisingly empty when the men came in. They walked over to the front desk and Brock rang a call bell, while Rusty leaned on the tabletop. A hotel worker appeared from the back room and greeted the clients with a weary smile “Good evening, sirs, what can I help you with?”

“Hi, we need a one night room,” the bodyguard put out his hand with the ID to the woman. “Double bed. Anything else is whatever”.

“So, you haven’t done the reservation, sir?”

“Ah, no,” Rusty cut in. “We were sort off driving by”. The hotel worker glanced understandingly at him and started typing something into a deck computer.

“There is an executive suite available for one night. King bed, nonsmoking. Is it all right to you, sirs?”

Rusty gave it a thought and scowled – the woman was trying to take him to the cleaners, offering one of the most expensive rooms, and Dr. Venture’s wallet wasn’t in the best state, so the man was ready to bargain.

“That’s fine,” Brock got a credit card out, and Rusty shut his mouth, slightly surprised by the gesture.

“Great. The room’s number is 602, here is the key, sir. If you need anything – you can dial 0”.

“Thanks,” the bodyguard took the key and snatched Dr. Venture’s hand shamelessly to drag him over to the elevator, which was few steps away from the reception.

“Executive suite, really?” Rusty shrugged getting into the car. “I bet they have plenty of free standard rooms”.

“Well,” the bodyguard smirked, “there’s only one thin’ in my mind right now, and it ain’t money”.

“Ow. Right,” the scientist smiled slightly in realization and pulled his jacket’s ham down. He completely forgot that Brock was a man of primal instincts; and even though the bodyguard had been keeping a straight face for about half an hour, inwardly he’d probably fucked Rusty many times in many different positions and places, and at that thought something flamed inside the scientist’s body.

The elevator doors opened. Brock was the first to go out and strode across the hallway. Rusty could barely keep up with the other man’s long steps. “Why are you so damn tall. I almost have to run after you,” he mumbled and bumped into the bodyguard’s back when Brock harshly stopped before their suite.

“Wait a sec,” the blond turned around. “I thought your wound’s already healed. Does it still hurt?”

“Pfff, I’m fine. It was a covert compliment, silly,” Rusty patted the agent on his chest teasingly, and the other man raised a brow. “What are you waiting for? Come on, Brock, the door won’t open itself”.

The bodyguard faced the suite hastily and got the key into the aperture with the second try, letting them inside - the door locked behind and lights automatically went on. Ravenous, Dr. Venture threw himself at the blond, standing on his toes, and clung to the other man’s lips. Brock grumbled, craving for the touch, and bent down to make it easier for Rusty, who brushed bodyguard’s cheeks and ran the fingers through his hair. The taller man’s hands were felling up Rusty’s back, crushing him closer, and when the bodyguard clutched Dr. Venture’s ass, the latter giggled with delight against Brock’s lips. Avid for more, Rusty pushed the agent’s jacket down the shoulders - the blond obediently took it off. 

Loosing items of clothes and tripping over stuff, the lovers danced into the living room. A massive wooden armchair on their way was brutally kicked and flew to the other side of the room with the sound of glass crashing. Fired up by the luscious smell of the smaller man, his little panting and eager touches, Brock lifted him on a nearby table and pinned up against it, towering above and overlooking the scientist. And he was absolutely stunning. There was nothing chaste or timid in his lustful eyes and promising smile.

“Did you take me here just to admire the view?” Rusty squinted and wrapped his legs around the other man’s waist, pulling him closer, so the scientist could feel Brock’s hardened dick against his own groin.

“Grrr, you don’t realize how fuckin’ gorgeous you look right now,” the bodyguard licked his lips.

“Oh, and I assumed you were a man of action,” Dr. Venture whispered alluringly with his eyes half-closed, and Brock attacked Rusty’s mouth greedily, releasing his arms. The smaller man was a delicious treat – nipping and sucking on the bodyguards lips he was moaning quietly in excitement, making Brock thrust into him with anticipation. One rapid move and the bodyguard’s shirt was undone, white buttons scattered over the floor – the scientist pressed his palm against the blond’s firm muscles, glided its way down to the impressive bulge and nudged it, earning a satisfied roar from the bodyguard. Dr. Venture didn’t even have to guess what size his lover’s cock was – he’d seen it more than once and now felt extra aroused imagining that huge thing penetrating him.

“Wait,” Brock pulled away abruptly, his blue irises almost disappeared under the dilated pupils. “I can’t force things like that”.

“What?..” whined the scientist and leaned on his elbows. “Please, don’t tell me you’ve change your mind all of a sudden”.

“I would never,” the bodyguard breathed out heavily and stepped back. “Listen, I don’t wanna hurt you, Doc. Ya look so… so fragile, and I don’t know how my dick could possibly, you know…”

“Brock, calm down,” Rusty got up. He came to the lover and took his hand gingerly to lay a soft kiss on its palm. “I’ll be fine,” he smiled sweetly and pressed to the bodyguard’s body, hugging him around the waist. “You’ve seen my vibrator, it’s about your size. I mean… it was definitely and absolutely not intentional. Not even in a slightest way, no”. Rusty bit his lip and pulled away. It was the moment when he realized he’d messed up exposing his naughty secret.

“All right then,” the bodyguard grinned and grabbed the scientist to slung him over his shoulder.

“I’m not a bag of potatoes, Brock,” Dr. Venture bitched, dangling his feet in the air while being carried through the suite.

The blond threw Rusty on the bed with a playful smize and started stripping for the other man to enjoy – he pulled down suspenders and tossed away the messed-up shirt. Shortly after trousers and boxers were taken off too, Brock confidently standing beside the bed naked. And, God knows, Rusty enjoyed the picture unfolding in front of him - the bodyguard was radiating sex itself with his hungry eyes, tense muscles covered in sweat, erected cock as long and thick as the scientist had remembered. Brock looked like a wild stallion, full of life and energy.

Without hesitation, the agent came closer to Rusty and got rid of his pants and underwear in one harsh move, leaving the smaller man in a shirt, that was barely covering his bits. The scientist spread his legs invitingly and Brock got into the bed, kneeling and bending over the lover. He placed a gentle kiss on Rusty’s thigh, acknowledging the discreet scar, and moved up to cover the other man’s subtle neck with his lips, licking and nibbling on the sensitive place, making Rusty pant harder. Hot breath was burning against the scientist’s skin, while skillful tongue was working its way down below and big gentle hands were unbuttoning the shirt. Desperately Dr. Venture threw his arms on the pillow and frowned trying to calm down as his lover started sucking on a nipple. Rusty couldn’t believe that his body was so unabashedly responsive for such caress - but on the other hand, it was the first time he’d experienced those things being done to him. Overfilled with the sexual enjoyment the smaller man didn’t hold back a helpless little whine, making Brock’s member twitch - the bodyguard had never assumed sweet dirty noises like that might ever escape Rusty’s mouth. And he needed more of those.

Reluctantly the taller man pulled away from his man and opened a drawer of a nightstand. Rusty closed his eyes, trying to get control over the body, his heart beating like a tom drum inside.

“Hey, ya didn’t fell asleep, did ya?” the smokey voice asked and when the scientist got back to reality, Brock was on top of him again. The agent took off Rusty’s glasses carefully and placed them on the nightstand.

Dr. Venture raised, smiling seductively, wrapped his hand around Brock’s neck and gave him a wet long kiss as an answered. He bit on the other man’s lip and slid the tongue across it, the scientist’s palm pressing against his lover’s sweaty chest and gliding down to the lower abdomen. With a roar, Brock threw the scientist’s legs up on his shoulders and lifted the man’s backside up slightly. Rusty shivered with a deep exhale as something cold and wet entered his body – apparently, the bodyguard had done his research and knew how to prepare a partner for the bottoming. 

Rusty’s hips rocked up and he whimpered as the other man bit on his nipple, his finger steadily going in and out of the scientist’s heated body, leaving the smaller man gasping for air under Brocks hot touches. "I wanna make ya scream my name," the bodyguard whispered and added the second finger, pure lust in his voice.

Dr. Venture smirked, holding back his craving "You'd better try harder than". The blond man grinned and pressed against his lover’s swollen lips, his free hand grabbing Rusty’s dick and spreading drops of pre-ejaculate across its head with the thumb, making the other man squirm with pleasure, a desirous cry getting out of his throat. Brock’s cock was desperately begging for attention itself, hard-as-rock, rubbing against Rusty’s wet body. The bodyguard couldn’t wait any longer and harshly popped the third finger inside his lover, jerking him off simultaneously. "Oh, my God!" Rusty screamed with despair after the blond had pressed at Rusty’s base so he wouldn’t cum "Just fuck me already!"

Brock of all men wasn’t the one to be told twice. Longing for the relieve, he got fingers out and sharply trusted into the hot and still tight hole, grunting full of desire. The other man arched his back with the closed eyes, weirdly enjoying the burning pain in his body, as Brock was moving roughly inside of him. Rusty sobbed quietly and covered his face with shaking hands, breathing heavily – he’d never felt that alive before. He was smiling through the tears, moving his hips forward to the Brocks thrusts, eager to take any agony his lover’s lust would provide.

"Wanna see you face, babe," the blond murmured and grabbed Dr. Venture’s wrists.

The scientist didn’t even try to stop him, when the bodyguard pinned Rusty’s hands up to the bed, reviling the fireworks of emotions on the smaller man’s face. Abruptly Brock stopped moving and froze, intimidated by Rusty’s state. "Are you... laughing and crying at the same time?" he asked hoarsely, a sign of concern on his face.

"Yes, I do," the man beamed with a sob. "I’ve never felt better, Brock! So please, don’t stop. Fuck me till I can’t understand shit anymore".

For Brock it was the line. He realized that he’d completely lost control trying to get himself satisfied, instead of caring about his lover’s needs at first. His lover, who’d never been with a man before, and who’d just lost his second virginity, for Christ's Sake. "I’m so sorry, Rusty,” Brock whispered and laid his mouth on the scientist’s one, pulling the man into a sensual kiss. “I’ll make it up to you, I promise," he assured and slowly continued moving in and out, hitting Dr. Venture’s pleasure spot, until the scientist was on the edge.

"Fuck!" he moaned loudly as Brock entered him with a full length again. "Don’t!.. Oh, shit, don’t you dare to stop!" he thrusted into his lover, clawing the bodyguard’s back in despair.

Brock growled seeing Rusty’s euphoria and began moving faster and faster, full of lust, feeling he was closer to blow his load. "Ahhh, damn! Cum inside of me, Brock," the smaller man cried out. His eyes rolled and wet lips parted as he was twitching in orgasm beneath the partner. And just the sight of that made the bodyguard lose his mind and jiz right after Rusty. Brock thrusted into him a few more times and fell down on the mattress beside. It had been the first time in many years when the agent cummed that fast, as a teenager that was head over heels in love.

"That was somethin’," he smiled like a fool and moved Rusty closer to nestle the man in his arms.

"Yeah," the scientist giggled and puffed. "Wow. And now I can really feel my but’s struggles. Your dick is fuckin’ huge".

Brock only laughed quietly and rubbed Rusty’s shoulder.

“What do you think about taking me to the shower?” the smaller man started circling his finger on Brock’s stomach. “My legs are still shaking and, well, that’s a bit awkward to say, but I think your cum is leaking out of me”.

“Wow,” bodyguard’s eyes lit up with starting fire. “Ya’re asking for the second round, my friend”.

“Brock! Don’t be so cruel,” Rusty pulled his legs and tried to cover up with the shirt, while Brock raised on his knees. “You’ve just deflowered me – I probably can’t even walk”.

“Oh, that’s great,” the bodyguard took Dr. Venture into his arms and lifted him bridal style above the bed. “Ya won’t run away then”.


End file.
